SHOP  COMMITTEE 


A  HANDBOOK  FOR 


EMPLOYER  AND  EMPLOYEE 


WILLIAM  LEAVITT  STODDARD 


AGO        2126 


•c. 


V 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

HKW  YORK  •    BOSTON  •   CHICAGO  •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA  •    SAN   FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TOKONTO 


THE 
SHOP  COMMITTEE 

A  HANDBOOK  FOR 
EMPLOYER  AND  EMPLOYEE 


BY 
WILLIAM  LEAVITT^  STODDARD 

A.  M.,  HARVARD 

Administrator  for  the  National  War  Labor 
Board,  1918-1919 


U3eto  gotk 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1919 

A.II  rights  referred 


COPTEISHT,  1919 

BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  May,  1919. 


FOKEWOKD 

THIS  book  is  neither  a  treatise,  a  history,  nor  a  com- 
plete study  of  the  shop  committee  movement  in  the 
United  States  and  abroad.  It  is  primarily  a  hand- 
book, designed  to  present  only  the  essential  principles 
and  facts  about  this  movement  to  those  who  desire  to 
know  what  shop  committees  are  and  how  they  work 
in  a  few  of  the  many  instances  in  which  they  have  been 
established. 

This  book  is  largely  the  result  of  the  writer's  experi- 
ence as  an  administrator  for  the  National  War  Labor 
Board,  somewhat  broadened  by  research  in  the  field 
outside  of  the  activities  of  that  Board.  This  field  is 
but  recently  come  under  cultivation:  the  shop  com- 
mittee is  a  new  thing  in  •  industry  and  is  still  in  the 
stage  of  experiment.  All  the  signs,  however,  indicate 
that  the  experiment  is  a  promising  one  and  that  for 
many  years  to  come  workingmen  and  employers  will 
continue  in  increasing  numbers  to  develop  intra-factory 
machinery  intended  to  eliminate  friction,  bring  about 
good  relations,  and  promote  the  practice  and  extension 
of  genuinely  collective  bargaining. 

As  an  imperfect  record  of  the  achievements  of  recent 
months  in  this  direction,  this  volume  is  respectfully 
offered  to  the  interested  public. 

WM.  LEAVITT  STODDAED. 

Cambridge,  Mass. 
March,  1919. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I    THE  EARLY  BEGINNINGS      .....  1 

II    THE  WAR  LABOR  BOARD  PLAN    ....  10 

III  GENERAL  PRINCIPLES 21 

IV  THE  BASIS  OF  REPRESENTATION      ...  31 
V    THE  LYNN  PLAN      .     .     .     ...     .41 

VI    THREE  CHARACTERISTIC  PLANS  ....  55 

VII    ELECTION  MACHINERY    .......  64 

VIII    PROCEDURE      .........  74 

IX     SHOP  COMMITTEES  IN  ACTION  ....  82 

X    THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE  AND  THE  UNIONS    91 

APPENDIX  .                                                             .  101 


THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

CHAPTEE  I 

THE  EARLY   BEGINNINGS 

IT  would  be  very  interesting  to  make  a  study  of  the 
causes  and  origins  of  the  shop  committee  movement.  If 
we  went  at  it  painstakingly,  we  might  well  find  our- 
selves back  at  the  dawn  of  industrial  history  when  a 
single  cave  man  employer  bargained  collectively  with  a 
committee  of  his  hired  men  concerning  the  piece  rate 
to  be  paid  for  killing  wolves  or  digging  clams.  The  fact 
is  that  the  idea  which  is  to-day  finding  expression  in  the 
shop  committee  movement  is  as  old  as  any  idea  in  the 
world.  Its  application,  however,  is  relatively  new  and 
has,  therefore,  a  relatively  short  history. 

For  a  considerable  period  as  time  is  measured  in  this 
age  of  rapid  change,  collective  bargaining  has  been  the 
subject  of  practical  experiment  in  the  garment-making 
industries  in  the  United  States,  and  much  has  there 
been  done  in  the  way  of  securing  peaceful  and  equitable 
settlement  of  disputes  through  machinery  which  is  simi- 
lar in  purpose  to  that  of  the  shop  committee  as  it  is  de- 
scribed in  this  book.  An  account  of  what  has  been  ac- 
complished in  this  particular  field  may  be  found  in 
"  Law  and  Order  in  Industry,"  by  Julius  Henry  Cohen, 
and  the  historic  relationship  between  the  movement 
there  described  and  that  which  is  springing  up  to-day 
may  easily  be  seen. 


2  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

The  Colorado  Plan 

Probably  the  most  notable  early  American  example 
of  a  shop  committee  system  as  it  is  now  in  course  of 
development  is  the  Colorado  Plan.  This  plan  of  repre- 
sentation was  adopted  late  in  1915  in  order  to  control 
relations  between  the  men  and  management  of  the  Col- 
orado Fuel  and  Iron  Company.  With  the  circum- 
stances of  the  strike  which  preceded  the  adoption  of  this 
plan  we  are  not  here  concerned  except  to  make  this  re- 
mark: apparently  the  adoption  of  this  plan  has  brought 
about  industrial  peace  in  the  section  of  Colorado  in- 
volved. At  the  very  least  it  has  removed  many  of  the 
causes  of  the  intensely  bitter  warfare  which  at  one  time 
called  the  attention  of  the  country  to  the  Colorado  situa- 
tion and  the  labor  policies  of  the  Kockefeller  interests. 

The  story  of  this  plan  has  often  been  told,  most  re- 
cently perhaps  in  "  Industry  and  Humanity,"  by  W.  L. 
MacKenzie  King,  who  had  much  to  do  with  its  incep- 
tion. 

I  choose,  however,  to  quote  a  brief  description  of  this 
plan  from  the  report  of  the  Federal  Commission  on  the 
Labor  Difficulties  in  the  Coal  Fields  of  Colorado,  ap- 
pointed by  the  President  in  1914.  "Your  Commission 
knows  nothing  just  like  it  in  force  anywhere,"  said  the 
report,  after  declaring  that  the  Colorado  plan  was  a 
"  new  departure  in  the  United  States."  "  The  impor- 
tance of  it,  as  an  effort  on  the  part  of  a  large  corpora- 
tion to  regulate  its  relations  with  its  own  employees,  by 
contracting  with  them  instead  of  through  a  trade  agree- 
ment made  with  a  labor  union,  justifies  your  Commis- 
sion in  discussing  this  plan  with  great  care.  .  .  . 

"The  essential  features  of  the  plan  seem  to  your  Commis- 
sion to  be  ( 1 )  that  the  relations  between  the  company  and  its 
employees  as  a  body  are  defined  by  contract;  (2)  that  every 
employee  is  guaranteed  the  right  to  belong  to  a  labor  union 
or  not,  as  he  pleases;  (3)  and  that  the  men  in  each  mine 


THE  EAELY  BEGINNINGS  3 

under  this  contract  are  entitled  to  choose  their  own  represen- 
tatives, these  representatives  being  protected  against  abuse  by 
the  company  by  a  clause  in  the  contract  which  entitles  them, 
if  they  have  been  discriminated  against  because  of  their  action 
as  representatives  of  the  men,  to  appeal  to  the  industrial  com- 
mission of  the  state;  and  the  contract  binds  the  company  on 
this  point,  also,  to  accept  as  final  the  finding  of  the  State  in- 
dustrial commission.  The  contract  provides  that  any  miner 
having  a  grievance,  or  any  group  of  miners,  may  appeal  from 
one  authority  to  another  until  the  president  of  the  company 
is  reached.  The  influence  of  this  provision,  although  the  con- 
tract has  been  in  operation  so  short  a  time,  has  been  greatly 
to  modify  the  attitude  of  the  mine  foremen  and  mine  superin- 
tendents and  of  the  subordinate  officials.  .  .  . 

"  The  plan  provides  further  for  the  selection  of  four  joint 
committees  representative  of  the  company  and  of  its  em- 
ployees: (1)  on  industrial  cooperation  and  conciliation;  (2) 
on  safety  and  accidents;  (3)  on  sanitation,  health  and  hous- 
ing; and  (4)  on  recreation  and  education.  This  part  of  the 
plan  went  into  operation  only  with  the  beginning  of  this  year. 
It  evidently  contemplates  the  most  far-reaching  cooperation 
between  the  employees  as  a  body  and  the  corporation,  as  to  all 
matters  which  affect  the  working  and  living  conditions  of  the 
employees." 

British  Experience 

In  Great  Britain,  about  the  same  time,  there  was 
growing  up  a  shop,  or  as  it  is  termed  there,  a  "  works  " 
committee  movement  which  is  in  many  ways  similar  to 
the  Colorado  plan.  This  movement  developed  rapidly. 
In  1917,  the  Eeconstruction  Committee,  which  later  be- 
came the  Ministry  of  Eeconstruction,  appointed  a  sub- 
committee with  J.  H.  Whitley  as  chairman,  to  report  on 
practical  methods  of  improving  the  relations  between 
capital  and  labor.  A  number  of  other  reports  on  the 
same  general  subject  were  made  subsequent. 

In  the  summary  of  the  preliminary  Whitley  report 
occurs  an  often-quoted  sentence  which  expresses  a  truth 
fundamental  to  the  whole  shop  committee  movement: 

"  The  feeling  in  the  minds  of  the  workers  that  their 
conditions  of  work  and  destinies  are  being  determined 


4  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

by  a  distant  authority  over  which  they  have  no  influence 
requires  to  be  taken  into  consideration,  not  only  by  the 
Government,  but  by  the  unions  themselves." 

The  Whitley  report,  however,  did  more  than  merely 
to  call  attention  to  a  state  of  mind,  important  as  that 
alone  was.  It  specifically  recommended  the  widest 
establishment  of  works  or  shop  committees  with  certain 
definite  functions.  It  outlined  an  entire  system  of  in- 
dustrial government,  one  vital  branch  of  which  is  the 
shop  committee.  Except  in  few  instances  has  the  move- 
ment in  this  country  gone  as  far  as  the  Whitley  report, 
but  if  we  wish  to  look  at  the  problem  broadly  and  with 
an  eye  to  the  future,  it  should  be  realized  that  the 
shop  committee  is,  after  all,  but  one  of  the  parts  of  a 
mechanism  for  the  adjustment  of  the  daily  relations 
between  capital  and  labor. 

For  each  industry  in  England  this  report  proposed 
a  Joint  Industrial  Council,  "  to  have  as  its  object  the 
regular  consideration  of  matters  affecting  the  progress 
and  well-being  of  the  trade  from  the  point  of  view  of 
all  those  engaged  in  it,  so  far  as  this  is  consistent  with 
the  general  interest  of  the  community."  The  type  of 
organization  which  was  suggested  for  the  industries  was 
something  quite  new.  At  the  top  there  was  to  be  a  joint 
industrial  council  —  national ;  lower  down,  a  joint  in- 
dustrial council  —  district  or  local;  and  finally,  at  the 
bottom,  works  committees  —  for  the  individual  shop  or 
plant.  Each  body,  as  the  word  "  joint "  implies,  was 
to  be  composed  of  representatives  both  of  men  and  of 
management.  In  other  words,  for  each  great  trade  or 
industry  there  was  to  be  established  a  three-fold,  semi- 
public  governmental  system,  built  up  in  such  a  way  as 
to  represent  fairly  both  capital  and  labor,  both  factory, 
district  and  nation. 


THE  EARLY  BEGINNINGS  5 

Its  Wide  Scope 

An  idea  of  the  wide  scope  which  the  acceptance  of  the 
Whitley  report  by  the  British  public  has  given  to  these 
newly  created  joint  councils  and  committees  may  be 
gained  when  it  is  realized  that  among  the  questions 
taken  up  by  men  and  management  and  threshed  out 
jointly  are: 

(1)  The  better  utilization  of  the  practical  knowledge 
and  experience  of  the  work  people. 

(2)  Means  for  securing  to  the  work  people  a  greater 
share  in  and  responsibility  for  the  determination  and 
observance  of  the  conditions  under  which  their  work 
is  carried  on. 

(3)  The  settlement  of  the  general  principles  govern- 
ing the  conditions  of  employment,  including  the  methods 
of  fixing,  paying,  and  readjusting  wages,  having  regard 
to  the  need  for  securing  to  the  work  people  a  share  in 
the  increased  prosperity  of  the  industry. 

(4)  The  establishment  of  regular  methods  of  nego- 
tiation for  issues  arising  between  employers  and  work 
people,  with  a  view  both  to  the  prevention  of  differences, 
and  to  their  better  adjustment  when  they  appear. 

(5)  Means  of  insuring  to  the  work  people  the  great- 
est possible  security  of  earnings  and  employment,  with- 
out undue  restriction  upon  change  of  occupation   or 
employer. 

(6)  Methods  of  fixing  and  adjusting  earnings,  piece- 
work prices,  etc.,  and  of  dealing  with  the  many  diffi- 
culties  which   arise  with  regard  to  the   method   and 
amount  of  payment  apart  from  the  fixing  of  general 
standard  rates,  which  are  already  covered  by  paragraph 
(3). 

(7)  Technical  education  and  training. 

(8)  Industrial  research  and  the  full  utilization  of 
its  results. 

(9)  The  provision  of  facilities  for  the  full  considera- 


6  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

tion  and  utilization  of  inventions  and  improvement  de- 
signed by  work  people,  and  for  the  adequate  safeguard- 
ing of  the  rights  of  the  designers  of  such  improvements. 

(10)  Improvements  of  processes,  machinery,  and  or- 
ganization and  appropriate  questions  relating  to  manage- 
ment and  the  examination  of  industrial  experiments, 
with  special  reference  to  cooperation  in  carrying  new 
ideas  into  effect  and  full  consideration   of  the  work 
people's  point  of  view  in  relation  to  them. 

(11)  Proposed  legislation  affecting  the  industry. 

With  some  few  exceptions,  the  shop  committee  idea 
may  be  said  to  have  remained  dormant  in  the  United 
States  during  the  period  in  which  the  groundwork  of 
the  structure  thus  pictured  in  the  Whitley  report  was 
being  laid.  But  the  entrance  of  the  United  States 
into  the  Great  War  in  the  spring  of  1917  was  speedily 
to  require  a  development  similar  to  that  which  had 
taken  place  in  England.  During  the  first  feverish 
twelve  months  of  preparation  after  the  declaration  of 
hostilities  against  Germany,  no  real  attempt  was  made 
to  remove  the  basic  cause  of  strikes.  Strikes  were 
discouraged  by  public  opinion,  but  that  was  all. 

War  Labor  Board  and  Shop  Committees 

Late  in  the  spring  of  1918,  however,  the  National 
War  Labor  Board  was  created  by  presidential  proclama- 
tion, and  immediately  began  to  act  as  court  of  last  resort 
in  industrial  disputes  in  which  war  production  was 
threatened.  Almost  in  the  first  award  of  this  body 
the  works  or  shop  committee  idea  was  adopted  as  a 
means  of  promoting  sound  relations  between  employer 
and  employee,  and  as  a  means,  further,  of  securing 
'what  was  most  urgently  needed  by  the  nation  at  that 
time,  namely,  maximum  war  production. 

With  the  history  of  this  Board  in  general  we  have 


THE  EARLY  BEGINNINGS  1. 

nothing  to  do  here;  that  belongs  rather  to  a  discussion 
of  the  development  of  arbitration.  But  it  is  both  per- 
tinent and  well  within  the  truth  to  say  that  the  most 
valuable  single  achievement  of  the  National  War  Labor 
Board  was  the  impetus  given  by  it  to  the  shop  committee 
movement. 

The  principles  upon  which  the  Board  operated, 
formally  agreed  to  by  representatives  of  capital  and 
labor,  contained  this  declaration :  "  The  right  of 
workers  to  organize  in  trades-unions  and  to  bargain 
collectively  through  chosen  representatives  is  recognized 
and  affirmed." 

Here  was  the  authorization,  if  any  were  needed,  for 
the  insertion  in  award  after  award  of  provisions  call- 
ing for  the  establishment  of  shop  committee  systems, 
and  in  a  following  chapter  will  be  found  the  shop 
committee  plan  as  worked  out  by  the  experts  of  the 
Board.  "The  encouragement  of  mutual  adjustments 
and  collective  bargaining  as  between  employer  and  em- 
ployees," runs  one  sentence  in  the  instructions  issued 
to  examiners  assigned  to  administer  awards,  "  will  prob- 
ably prove  the  most  valuable  and  lasting  work  which 
an  administrative  examiner  can  perform." 

During  these  same  war  months,  the  principle  of  col- 
lective bargaining  was  consistently  advanced  by  the 
Federal  Government  in  practically  all  its  direct  and 
indirect  dealings  with  labor,  and  thus  there  was  estab- 
lished a  solid  body  of  experience  and  opinion  in  favor 
of  the  fundamental  theory  upon  which  the  shop  commit- 
tee movement  rests.  This  movement,  begun  in  this 
fashion,  is  that  with  which  we  are  chiefly  concerned 
in  the  following  pages.1 

i  The  literature  on  the  shop  committee  and  the  general 
movement  toward  democratic  control  of  industry  is  relatively 
new  and  correspondingly  small.  Great  Britain,  as  might  be 
expected,  furnishes  the  bulk.  The  books  listed  below  bear  more 


8  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

The  Economic  Need 

\Ve  shall  see  in  Chapter  X  that  the  real  economic 
need  for  shop  committees  in  American  as  well  as  in 
British  factories  during  the  war  and  after  came  from 
the  fact  that  in  spite  of  the  great  value  of  the  trades 
unions  in  collective  bargaining,  the  trades  unions  were 
not  and  never  had  been  organized  to  handle  efficiently 
the  many  intimate,  localized  problems  of  the  individual 

or  less  directly  on  the  subject  matter  of  the  present  volume, 
particularly  the  book  by  W.  L.  MacKenzie  King  and  the  re- 
prints of  official  English  documents  published  by  the  United 
States  Shipping  Board. 

"  War  Time  Control  of  Industry,  The  Experience  of  Eng- 
land," Howard  L.  Gray.  The  Macmillan  Co. 

"  The  Great  Change,"  Charles  W.  Wood.  Boni  and  Live- 
right. 

"  Labor  and  Capital  after  the  War,"  edited  by  S.  J.  Chap- 
man. John  Murray. 

"  Industrial  Reconstruction,"  edited  by  Huntley  Carter. 
E.  P.  Button. 

"  Industry   and   Humanity,"   W.   L.   MacKenzie   King. 

"  The  Aims  of  Labor,"  Arthur  Henderson.     B.  W.  Huebsch. 

"  The  Creative  Impulse  in  Industry,"  Helen  Marot.  E.  P. 
Dutton. 

"  Collective  Bargaining  and  Trade  Agreements  in  the  Brew- 
ery, Metal,  Teaming,  and  Building  Trades  of  San  Francisco, 
Calif.,"  Ira  B.  Cross.  University  of  California  Press. 

"  Fair  Play  for  the  Workers,"  Percy  S.  Grant.  Moffatt 
Yard  &  Co. 

"  Workshop  Committees,"  C.  G.  Renold.  The  Survey  Asso- 
ciates. 

Memorandum  on  the  Industrial  Situation  After  the  War 
(reprint  of  the  memorandum  issued  by  the  Garton  Founda- 
tion, London).  United  States  Shipping  Board. 

Report  of  an  Inquiry  as  to  Works  Committees  (reprint  of  a 
report  made  by  the  British  Ministry  of  Labor).  United 
States  Shipping  Board. 

"  Works  Committees  and  Joint  Industrial  Councils,"  A.  B. 
Wolfe.  United  States  Shipping  Board.  (Contains  valuable 
bibliography.) 

Monthly  Review,  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics,  U.  S. 
Dept.  of  Labor,  passim. 


THE  EAELY  BEGINNINGS  9 

factory.  And  for  the  matter  of  that,  neither  were 
employers  properly  organized  to  cope  with  these  same 
problems.  There  was,  in  short,  a  sheer  lack  of  ma- 
chinery designed  to  eliminate  internal  shop  friction, 
whether  over  large  matters  or  small  matters.  One 
who  has  studied  typical  plants  which  have  well  planned 
shop  committee  systems  and  typical  plants  which  are 
still  operating  in  the  old  disorganized  fashion,  can  not 
hesitate  to  agree  that  neither  the  recognition  of  the 
union  nor  the  introduction  of  "  efficiency "  ideas  will 
do  the  good  —  to  employer,  to  employee  and  to  the 
public  —  that  can  be  gained  by  falling  into  step  with 
evolution  and  utilizing  the  advantages  of  this  new 
form  of  industrial  self-government, 

"  The  movement,"  says  W.  L.  MacKenzie  King  in 
his  book  above  referred  to,  "  is  not  without  its  critics 
among  both  employers  and  labor  leaders,  and  it  en- 
counters of  necessity  the  opposition  of  upholders  of 
militancy  in  industrial  affairs  and  the  advocates  of  clasa 
hatreds.  It  will  reveal  shortcomings,  make  mistakes, 
experience  setbacks  and  failures;  and  it  is  probable 
that  some  time  must  elapse  before  its  benefits  will  be 
appreciated.  '  The  change  of  attitude  involved  is  too 
vital,  the  field  of  activity  is  too  large,  to  hope  for  any 
but  gradual  development.'  But  the  scheme  has  in  it 
the  germ  of  all  that  has  made  for  freedom  in  political 
evolution;  and  it  has  to  promote  it  the  genius  for  self- 
government  which  the  British  peoples  have  evolved 
through  centuries  of  struggle.  It  is  therefore  destined 
to  win  its  way.  Meanwhile,  it  will  remain  the  surest 
method  of  approach  to  the  solution  of  the  problems  of 
Industry  which  wide  knowledge  of  actual  conditions, 
combined  with  many-sided  opinion,  has  thus  far 
evolved."  1 

iM     italics.     W.  L.  S. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   WAR   LABOR   BOARD   PLAN 

BEGINNING  late  in  the  spring  of  1918  the  United  States 
Government,  as  a  war  measure,  began  to  organize  shop 
committees  and  to  develop  the  theory  and  practice  of 
the  shop  committee  system.  The  Government  per- 
formed this  function  through  the  National  War  Labor 
Board  and  other  war-time  agencies.  Its  main  purpose 
was  to  attempt  to  set  the  house  of  capital  and  labor 
in  order,  first  so  that  essential  industries  would  be 
kept  running  during  the  hostilities,  and  second  so  that 
industry  would  be  more  stable  and  prosperous  during 
the  period  of  demobilization  and  reconstruction. 

It  may  be  noted  in  passing  that  it  was  not  a  new 
thing  for  Uncle  Sam  to  play  the  part  of  organizer  of 
cooperative  associations.  For  many  years  the  United 
States  Department  of  Agriculture  has  most  energetically 
promoted  the  formation  of  farmers'  cooperatives,  which 
are  fundamentally  collective  bargaining  associations. 
This  work  of  the  Washington  government  has  brought 
benefits  to  those  living  in  the  rural  regions  that  can 
be  measured  in  dollars  and  cents,  and  has  also  served 
as  a  precedent  for  similar  activities  in  the  world  of 
industry. 

The  Pittsfield  Award 

One  of  the  first  awards  of  the  National  War  Labor 
Board,  if  not  the  very  first  to  recommend  a  shop  com- 
mittee system,  was  the  award  in  the  case  of  the  em- 
ployees versus  the  General  Electric  Co.,  Pittsfield 

10 


THE  WAE  LABOR  BOARD  PLAN    11 

Works,  Massachusetts.     Towards  the  end  of  this  award 
are  these  paragraphs : 

"  Election  of  Committees. 

"  The  election  by  the  workers  of  their  representative  depart- 
ment committees  to  present  grievances  and  mediate  with  the 
company  shall  be  held,  during  the  life  of  this  award,  in  some 
convenient  public  building  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  plant, 
to  be  selected  by  the  examiner  of  this  board  assigned  to  su- 
pervise the  execution  of  this  award,  or,  in  the  case  of  hia 
absence,  by  some  impartial  person,  a  resident  of  Pittsfield,  to 
be  selected  by  such  examiner.  Such  examiner,  or  his  substi- 
tute, shall  preside  over  the  first  and  all  subsequent  elections 
during  the  life  of  this  award,  and  have  the  power  to  make  the 
proper  regulations  to  secure  absolute  fairness. 

"  In  the  elections  the  examiner  shall  provide,  wherever 
practicable,  for  the  minority  representation  by  limiting  the 
right  of  each  voter  to  a  vote  for  less  than  the  total  number  of 
the  committee  to  be  selected.  Elections  shall  be  held  annually. 

"  Duties  of  Department  Committees. 

"  The  duties  of  the  department  committees  shall  be  confined 
to  the  adjustment  of  disputes  which  the  shop  foremen  and  the 
division  superintendents  and  the  employees  have  been  unable 
to  adjust. 

"  The  department  committees  shall  meet  annually  and  shall 
select  from  among  their  number  three  ( 3 )  employees  who  shall 
be  known  as  the  committee  on  appeals.  This  committee  shall 
meet  with  the  management  for  the  purpose  of  adjusting  dis- 
putes which  the  department  committees  have  failed  to  adjust." 

It  so  happened  that  the  writer  was  assigned  to  act 
as  the  examiner  or  administrator  of  the  Pittsfield  award, 
and  can  therefore  speak  both  from  official  and  personal 
observation  of  this  very  interesting  experiment  in  in- 
dustrial government. 

At  this  time,  the  latter  part  of  the  summer  of  1918, 
the  Pittsfield  Works  of  the  General  Electric  Company 
employed  about  7,000  men  and  women.  The  plant  was 
engaged  in  manufacturing  many  important  articles  used 
directly  and  indirectly  by  the  Government  and  neces- 
sary for  the  war  program  of  the  Government.  Maxi- 
mum production  and  the  elimination  of  internal  strife 


12  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

was  therefore  a  matter  of  public  concern.  It  should 
be  added  that  while  a  majority  of  the  employees  were 
members  of  organized  labor,  the  plant  was  and  still  is 
an  open  shop. 

For  some  time  before  the  award  of  the  National 
War  Labor  Board  there  had  been  in  existence  in  this 
plant  a  General  Works  Committee,  which  consisted  of 
about  fifty  employees,  and  which  was  elected  by  the 
rank  and  file  of  the  workers  at  an  election  held  each 
year  in  the  factory  buildings.  For  various  reasons  this 
shop  committee,  or  shop  committee  system,  was  not 
satisfactory  to  the  employees  who  came  before  the  Board. 
One  of  the  reasons  was  that  a  single  general  committee 
could  not  handle  promptly  and  fairly  the  grievances 
which  constantly  came  up  in  the  plant.  The  justice 
of  this  claim  was  admitted  by  the  Board,  and  a  new 
system  was  therefore  ordered. 

By  way  of  further  explanation  it  should  be  said  that 
before  the  award  of  the  War  Labor  Board  there  had 
been  a  serious  strike  in  the  Pittsfield  Works.  This 
strike  had  brought  about  an  era  of  bad  feeling  between 
men  and  management  which  lasted  several  months  and 
which  seriously  complicated  and  made  difficult  the  task 
of  working  out  calmly  and  in  joint  conference  the 
details  of  the  award.  I  mention  this  fact  not  for  the 
purpose  of  opening  old  sores,  but  in  order  to  illustrate 
a  very  important  fact  in  the  shop  committee  movement 
—  the  fact  that  unless  both  the  employer  and  the 
employees  have  the  right  spirit,  the  spirit  of  coopera- 
tion, the  spirit  of  dealing  man  to  man  in  sensible, 
reasonable  fashion,  it  is  almost  impossible  to  set  going 
an  orderly  and  workable  shop  committee  system. 

Features  of  the  Plan 

The  Pittsfield  shop  committee  plan  of  the  War  Labor 
Board  is  not  like  most  of  the  plans  subsequently  ap- 


THE  WAK  LABOK  BOAKD  PLAN    13 

proved  by  the  Board.  For  example,  it  provided  that  the 
Elections  should  be  held,  not  in  the  shop,  but  in  some 
convenient  public  building.  The  reason  for  this  pro- 
vision in  this  particular  case  was  that  the  Board  desired 
to  give  neither  side  any  possible  grounds  for  claiming 
that  either  the  company  or  the  unions  had  influenced 
the  elections.  Back  of  this  lay  the  declaration  of  the 
Board,  laid  down  as  a  general  principle  for  all  industry 
during  the  war,  that  "In  establishments  where  the 
union  shop  exists  the  same  shall  continue.  ...  In 
establishments  where  union  and  non-union  men  and 
women  now  work  together  and  the  employer  meets 
only  with  employees  or  representatives  engaged  in  said 
establishments,  the  continuance  of  such  conditions  shall 
not  be  deemed  a  grievance." 

In  plain  English,  this  meant  that  it  was  the  duty 
of  the  Board  to  see  to  it  that  the  unions  did  not  take 
advantage  of  the  war  and  of  the  war-time  establish- 
ment of  shop  committees  to  force  union  recognition. 
It  also  means  that  it  was  the  duty  of  the  Board  to  see 
to  it  that  every  employee  in  the  plant,  whether  belong- 
ing to  a  union  or  not,  had  the  chance  to  vote  and  run 
for  office. 

Another  consideration  had  much  to  do  with  the  de- 
cree that  the  elections  should  be  held  on  neutral  ground. 
This  was  that  there  was  then  a  feeling  of  hostility  among 
certain  of  the  employees  against  the  company:  a  feel- 
ing so  deep  that  almost  without  exception  the  leaders 
testified  that  if  the  elections  were  held  inside  the  plant 
the  men  would  not  vote.  At  the  same  time,  however, 
these  same  leaders  declared  that  the  former  elections, 
which  had  been  held  in  the  plant  and  managed  by 
the  company,  had  been  absolutely  fair  and  square. 
But  there  was  the  prejudice  of  the  rank  and  file  to 
overcome,  and  the  War  Labor  Board  thought  that  the 
best  way  to  overcome  it  was  to  hold  the  elections  in  a 


14  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

place  where  no  one  could  pretend  that  either  the  unions 
or  the  company  could  control  in  any  way,  shape  or 
manner. 

There  was  still  another  reason  for  selecting  "some 
convenient  public  building."  One  of  the  principles  of 
the  Board  declared  that  workers  have  the  right  "to 
organize  in  trades-unions  and  to  bargain  collectively 
through  chosen  representatives/'  The  right  to  choose 
representatives  was  thought  to  carry  with  it  the  right 
to  choose  them  freely,  or  as  freely  as  was  consistent 
with  other  circumstances.  The  other  circumstances 
which  limited  this  freedom  were  the  declarations  of  the 
Board  to  which  labor  and  capital  were  pledged  for 
the  period  of  the  war,  to  the  effect  that  labor  unions 
should  not  seek  to  obtain  recognition  through  the  elec- 
tion of  committees,  and  that  employers  should  not 
discriminate  against  union  employees.  In  theory,  the 
argument  went,  nothing  could  better  guarantee  a  free, 
uninfluenced  election  than  to  have  it  in  a  public  build- 
ing under  the  supervision  of  an  officer  of  the  Govern- 
ment. 

I  have  gone  into  these  matters  in  some  detail  because 
the  Pittsfield  shop  committee  system  was  one  of  the  first 
attempts  of  the  War  Labor  Board  to  put  the  theory 
of  the  shop  committee  into  practice.  As  often  hap- 
pens, there  was  nothing  wrong  with  the  theory,  though 
the  application  of  it,  as  will  be  seen  later,  might  have 
been  improved. 

The  Pittsfield  award  contained  another  provision 
which  was  discarded  in  subsequent  awards.  This  was 
the  provision  for  minority  representation.  The  idea  was 
this :  Roughly  one  third  of  the  employees  of  the  Pitts- 
field  Works,  or  a  minority  of  the  whole,  did  not  belong 
to  any  union.  The  Board,  fearing  that  the  union  em- 
ployees might  control  the  elections  and  shut  the  non- 
union employees  out  completely,  gave  instructions  that 


15 

when,  for  example,  two  union  and  one  non-union  candi- 
dates were  nominated  on  the  same  slate,  each  voter 
should  mark  his  ballot  for  two  instead  of  for  three.  It 
was  calculated  that  in  this  way  the  minority  would  be 
sure  to  secure  a  fair  share  of  the  offices.  In  practice, 
however,  it  was  speedily  found  that  with  one  or  two 
exceptions  the  minority  favored  all  the  nominees  and 
offered  none  of  their  own.  Most  of  the  elections  were 
unanimous.  By  simply  allowing  great  freedom  in  mak- 
ing nominations,  the  minority  had  every  opportunity  to 
be  represented. 

Two  Kinds  of  Committees 

As  defined  in  the  award  the  shop  committees  were  to 
be  of  two  kinds.  First,  there  were  to  be  department 
or  shop  committees  representing  the  employees  of  the 
different  sections  of  the  works,  elected  by  the  employees 
of  each  section,  voting  separately  as  a  section.  Second, 
there  was  to  be  a  general  or  appeals  committee  of  three, 
elected  by  the  members  of  the  shop  committees,  meet- 
ing in  a  convention  called  for  that  purpose.  The  shop 
committees  were  to  have  the  duty  of  adjusting  disputes 
which  individual  employees  had  failed  to  adjust  either 
with  their  foremen  or  their  division  superintendent. 
The  appeals  committee,  as  its  name  implies,  was  to 
take  up  with  the  management  cases  which  the  shop 
or  department  committees  had  been  unable  to  settle 
satisfactorily. 

This  new  plan  was  a  great  improvement  over  the 
single  General  Works  committee  of  fifty  which  had 
previously  represented  the  employees  in  dealing  with 
the  management.  As  compared  with  the  plans  worked 
out  by  the  Board  in  some  other  places,  however,  as  for 
example,  the  Lynn  General  Electric  Works,  the  Bridge- 
port munition  plants,  and  the  Philadelphia  Eapid  Tran- 
sit Company,  the  Pittsfield  plan  was  incomplete. 


16  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

Nevertheless  the  Pittsfield  plan  was  put  into  opera- 
tion. The  steps  in  this  process  may  be  briefly  summed 
up: 

The  first  step  was  to  district  the  plant.  The  award 
called  for  "  department "  committees.  But  what  was 
a  department  ?  Were  the  cranemen,  for  example,  whose 
work  took  them  all  over  the  plant,  and  who  reported 
to  various  foremen,  to  be  considered  a  department? 
Should  a  department  consist  of  a  more  or  less  fixed 
number  of  workers;  or  should  a  department  be  defined 
as  all  the  workers  under  a  single  foreman?  Should 
a  department  be  on  one  floor,  or  might  one  department 
include  a  floor  and  a  gallery,  or  two  floors?  Should 
a  department  be  composed  of  workers  of  the  same 
trade?  In  short,  what  ought  to  be  the  basis  of  repre- 
sentation? 

Working  It  Out 

These  questions  were  not  answered  in  Pittsfield  to 
the  complete  mutual  satisfaction  of  men  and  manage- 
ment, and  to  that  extent  and  for  that  the  reason  the 
Pittsfield  plan  as  it  was  in  operation  as  late  as  March 
1919  cannot  be  termed  a  good  example  of  a  working 
shop  committee  system.  The  Pittsfield  management 
opposed,  on  principle,  the  idea  of  holding  the  elections 
outside  the  plant,  and  for  this  and  other  reasons  the 
districting  of  the  plant  was  left  to  the  men  and  the 
representative  of  the  War  Labor  Board.  The  plant  was 
not  districted  as  it  should  have  been,  that  is,  coopera- 
tively by  the  joint  counsel  of  men  and  management. 
In  a  later  chapter  the  theory  of  districting  is  con- 
sidered in  detail.  It  is  a  most  important  question,  if 
not  the  most  important  single  question  which  has  to 
be  met  in  working  out  a  shop  committee  system. 

In  spite  of  the  difficulty  just  referred  to,  the  elec- 
tions were  held  in  a  vacant  store  near  the  plant,  used 


THE  WAR  LABOR  BOARD  PLAN    17 

by  the  city  as  a  polling  place.  Owing  partly  to  the 
fact  that  the  elections  were  held  outside  company  time, 
namely  from  5  to  8  or  9  p.  M.,  the  attendance,  while 
representative,  was  not  as  large  as  it  would  have  been 
had  the  elections  been  held  under  the  most  favorable 
circumstances  in  the  plant  itself.  But  the  committees 
were  chosen  as  decreed  by  the  award,  were  recognized 
by  the  management,  and  proceeded  to  perform  their 
functions.  Thus  ended  the  duty  of  Uncle  Sam  in  his 
pioneer  role  of  industrial  organizer. 

During  the  same  summer  and  fall  of  1918,  the  War 
Labor  Board  decreed  that  the  Pittsfield  shop  committee 
system  should  be  installed  in  several  other  plants  which 
were  manufacturing  war  material  for  the  Government. 
From  the  reports  which  came  from  these  places,  as  well 
as  from  Bridgeport,  where  a  gigantic  problem  con- 
fronted the  examiner  of  the  Board  assigned  to  the 
supervision  of  the  Bridgeport  award,  there  was  developed 
a  standardized  plan  for  shop  committee  systems.  This 
plan  was  not  intended  to  fit  every  industry  without  some 
alteration.  But  it  did  —  and  still  does  —  embody  all 
the  basic  principles  which  experience  in  the  field  has 
proved  to  be  sound  and  workable. 

I  quote  this  plan  in  full  at  this  point.  In  the  next 
and  following  chapters  the  most  important  practical 
problems  involved  in  putting  it  into  operation  will  be 
taken  up : 

NATIONAL  WAR  LABOR  BOARD 
WASHINGTON 

PROCEDURE 

ELECTIONS  OF  SHOP  COMMITTEES 

In  cases  where  elections  are  required  to  be  held  for  the  pur- 
pose of  selecting  Shop  Committees,  the  following  shall  be  the 
procedure : 


18  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

1.     Number  of  Committeemen 

Shop  Committees  shall  be  selected  to  meet  with  an  equal 
or  a  lesser  number  of  representatives  to  be  selected  by  the 
employer.  Each  department  or  section  of  the  shop  shall  be 
entitled  to  one  committeeman  for  each  one  hundred  employees 
employed  in  the  department  or  section.  If  in  any  department 
or  section  there  shall  be  employees  in  excess  of  any  even  hun- 
dred, then  an  additional  committeeman  may  be  elected  pro- 
vided the  additional  employees  beyond  the  even  hundred  shall 
be  fifty  or  more;  if  less  than  fifty,  no  additional  representation 
shall  be  allowed.  As  an  example:  In  a  department  or  section 
employing  330  men,  three  committeemen  will  be  elected;  in  a 
department  employing  375  men,  four  committeemen  will  be 
elected. 

2.     Nominations 

Due  notice  having  been  given  of  an  election,  10  days  shall  be 
allowed  during  which  nominations  may  be  made  for  candidates. 
In  order  that  a  candidate's  name  may  appear  on  the  ballot, 
such  person  must  be  nominated  either  at  a  meeting  of  the 
employees  or  any  part  of  them  duly  called  for  that  purpose, 
or  by  petition  signed  by  not  less  than  10  per  cent  of  those 
qualified  to  vote  for  any  candidate  so  nominated. 

a.  By  Convention 

Meetings  for  nomination  of  candidates  may  be  held  at  any 
places  named  in  the  calls  for  the  same.  The  nominations  and 
the  attendance  of  at  least  10  per  cent  of  the  persons  entitled 
to  vote  for  nominees  at  any  such  meeting  must  be  certified  to 
by  the  chairman  and  secretary  of  the  meeting. 

6.  By  Petition 

All  nominating  petitions  must  clearly  name  the  candidate  or 
candidates  and  have  the  signature  of  not  less  than  10  per 
cent  of  the  bona  fide  employees  qualified  to  vote  for  such 
candidate. 

c.  Filing  Nominations 

Nominations  made  either  by  meeting  or  by  petition  must  be 
sent  to  the  examiner  of  the  National  War  Labor  Board  not 
later  than  10  days  after  the  notice  of  election  is  given,  and  the 
election  shall  be  held  on  the  fifth  day  next  succeeding  unless 
such  day  should  be  Saturday  or  Sunday  or  a  holiday,  in  which 
event  the  election  shall  be  held  on  the  next  successive  work  day. 


THE  WAR  LABOR  BOARD  PLAN    19 

d.  Publishing  Lists  of  Nominees 

Lists  of  candidates  selected  by  convention  or  petition  and 
distinctively  designated,  may  be  posted  by  their  respective 
supporters  on  a  bulletin  board  to  be  provided  by  the  employer, 
convenient  to  the  voting  booths,  to  assist  voters  in  marking 
their  ballots. 

3.     Elections 
a.  Place 

The  election  shall  be  held  in  the  place  where  the  largest 
total  vote  of  the  men  can  be  secured,  consistent  with  fairness 
of  count  and  full  and  free  expression  of  choice,  either  in  the 
shop  or  in  some  convenient  public  building,  as  the  chief  exam- 
iner shall  decide  after  conference,  if  need  be,  with  the  Secretary 
of  the  National  War  Labor  Board. 

6.  Election  Officers 

The  election  shall  be  conducted  under  the  supervision  of  an 
examiner  of  the  National  War  Labor  Board,  who  shall  select 
as  assistants  two  or  more  employees  of  the  department  or  sec- 
tion for  which  the  election  is  held.  These  persons  shall  con- 
stitute the  Election  Board,  which  will  conduct  the  election, 
count  the  votes,  and  certify  as  to  the  correctness  of  the  count. 

An  employee  of  the  company  to  be  nominated  by  t"  e  em- 
ployer, who  shall  preferably  be  the  timekeeper  or  some  one 
connected  with  the  proper  department  or  section,  who  is  quali- 
fied to  certify  to  and  identify  the  voters  as  bona  fide  employees' 
shall  assist  the  Election  Board  in  its  duties. 

c.  Freedom  from  Undue  Influence 

All  elections  shall  be  held  in  accordance  with  the  Australian 
or  secret  ballot.  The  names  of  all  the  nominees  shall  be 
printed  in  alphabetical  order  on  the  ballot,  which  shall  clearly 
state  the  number  to  be  voted  for.  This  ballot  shall  be  in  the 
form  that  it  may  be  folded  so  as  to  conceal  the  nature  of  the 
vote.  Each  employee  presenting  himself  shall  be  certified  to 
as  qualified  to  vote  and  handed  a  ballot  by  the  tellers.  Upon 
indicating  upon  the  ballot  by  marking  a  cross  opposite  the 
names  of  the  candidates  for  whom  the  employee  wishes  to  vote, 
he  shall  himself  place  it  in  the  ballot  box.  A  booth  or  booths 
shall  be  provided  where  the  employee  may  indicate  his  choice 
free  from  observation. 

Foremen  and  other  officials  of  the  company  shall  absent 
themselves  from  the  election  to  remove  ground  for  a  claim  of 
undue  influence. 


20  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

d.  Declaration  of  Election 

The  candidates  receiving  the  greatest  number  of  votes  shall 
be  declared  elected  by  the  Election  Board.  In  the  event  of  a 
tie  vote,  the  examiner  of  the  National  War  Labor  Board  shall 
call  for  a  new  election  within  five  days. 

4.     Change  of  Procedure   by  Agreement 

After  the  initial  election  under  the  supervision  of  the  exam- 
iner of  the  National  War  Labor  Board,  subsequent  elections 
and  any  general  rules  or  regulations  pertaining  to  the  selec- 
tion of  Shop  Committees  may  be  carried  out  through  agreement 
between  the  employer  and  the  committee  so  elected.  Proper 
provision  should  be  made  for  reports  of  the  Shop  Committees 
from  time  to  time  to  their  respective  constituencies. 

Approved  by  the  Joint  Chairmen,  October  4,  1918. 

As  this  book  goes  to  press,  (April,  1919),  the 
National  War  Labor  Board  is  still  in  existence  and  is 
still  promoting  the  shop  committee  movement.  Should 
this  Board  continue  by  Act  of  Congress  as  a  permanent 
industrial  court,  without  question  it  will  become  one 
of  the  best  possible  sources  of  information  in  the  country 
on  the  question  of  shop  committee  systems.  In  the  brief 
history  of  this  Board  from  its  formation  to  date,  it 
has  been  under  the  fire  of  both  capital  and  labor.  The 
unfriendly  criticism  which  it  has  received  has  been  un- 
fortunate for  several  reasons,  but  chiefly  because  it 
has  led  public  attention  away  from  the  real  and  neces- 
sary constructive  work  which  the  Board  has  been  doing 
from  the  very  start.  I  refer  of  course  to  the  establish- 
ment of  shop  committee  systems,  and  from  my  copy 
of  a  memorandum  entitled  "  Instructions  to  Examiners 
Assigned  to  Administer  Awards/'  I  quote  the  following 
sentence : 

"  The  encouragement  of  mutual  adjustments  and  collective 
bargaining  as  between  employer  and  employees,  will  probably 
prove  the  most  valuable  and  lasting  work  which  an  Adminis- 
trative Examiner  can  perform." 


CHAPTER  III 

GENERAL   PRINCIPLES 

IN  Chapter  I  the  history  of  the  shop  committee  move- 
ment was  briefly  sketched,  and  in  Chapter  II  the  be- 
ginnings of  the  movement  as  promoted  and  standardized 
by  the  United  States  Government  were  related.  At 
this  point,  before  going  into  further  detail,  it  will  be 
valuable  to  try  to  get  at  the  basic  principles  which 
underlie  the  shop  committee  plan  of  the  National  War 
Labor  Board,  and  of  the  movement  as  it  is  spreading 
to-day. 

What  are  these  principles? 

It  will  make  it  easier  to  understand  and  explain  the 
shop  committee  if  it  is  understood  and  realized  at  the 
start  that  a  shop  committee  system  is  really  an  experi- 
ment in  democratic  industrial  government.  The  word 
experiment  is  used  because  shop  committee  systems  are 
in  their  infancy,  and  are  rapidly  changing  in  form. 
The  words  democratic  industrial  government  are  used 
because  after  all  what  a  shop  committee  system  actually 
does  in  a  factory  is  to  establish  a  system  of  govern- 
ment to  control  democratically  the  relations  between 
employer  and  employee. 

A  factory  in  which  neither  shop  committees  nor 
trades  unions  are  recognized  must  necessarily  be  more 
or  less  of  an  autocracy,  and  recent  events  in  Europe 
and  elsewhere  have  demonstrated  again  to  the  world 
the  old  truth  that  an  autocracy  is  practically  no  gov- 
ernment at  all,  because  it  is  an  unjust  and  unstable 
government.  What  is  going  on  in  the  United  States 

21 


22  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

to-day  is,  therefore,  a  revolution  in  industry.  The  ob- 
ject of  this  revolution  is  to  overthrow  obsolete  auto- 
cratic methods  of  doing  business  between  employer  and 
employee  and  to  substitute  new  and  democratic  methods. 

Compared  to  U.  S.  Government 

The  shop  committee  system  of  government  does  not 
resemble  the  kind  of  representative  democratic  govern- 
ment which  we  have,  for  example,  in  the  United  States. 
The  theory  of  the  American  government  is  that  the 
people  elect  their  servants  whose  duty  it  is  to  make  and 
execute  laws  under  a  constitution,  which  in  turn  can  be 
changed  by  the  people.  The  theory  of  the  shop  com- 
mittee system  form  of  government  is  that  the  employees 
elect  their  representatives  who  meet  with  an  equal  num- 
ber of  representatives  of  the  management.  Thus  in  the 
United  States  Government  there  is  only  one  source  of 
power,  the  people.  In  the  shop  committee  system  gov- 
ernment, there  are  two  sources  of  power.  This  is  what 
is  commonly  called  "  joint  control,"  and  the  various 
branches  of  the  government  are  called  "  joint  com- 
mittees." 

But  the  phrase  "  joint  control "  is  bound  to  be  mis- 
understood if  it  is  not  explained  further.  The  rela- 
tions between  employer  and  employee  in  a  factory  hav- 
ing a  shop  committee  system  are  controlled  jointly  or 
collectively  up  to  a  certain  point  only.  The  committee- 
men  representing  the  employees  may  be  able  to  agree 
with  the  committeemen  representing  the  management  on 
a  large  number  of  important  matters,  but  when  they 
fail  to  agree,  the  joint  method  of  settling  disputes  is  at 
an  end:  the  matter  goes  to  the  manager,  who,  being  in 
charge  of  the  factory,  has  the  veto  power.  The  manager 
will  side  either  with  the  employees  or  with  his  own 
representatives.  In  any  case  his  decision  is  final,  so  far 
as  the  shop  committee  system  is  concerned.  If,  how- 


GENERAL  PRINCIPLES  23 

ever,  the  matter  in  dispute  is  vital  to  the  employees, 
they  may  ask  that  it  be  arbitrated  by  outside  parties, 
and  they  will  probably  threaten  to  stop  work  if  it  is  not 
left  to  some  impartial  body,  such  as  the  War  Labor 
Board.  Such  a  case  shows  clearly  that  the  shop  com- 
mittee system  is  not  in  itself  complete. 

In  many  shop  committee  plans,  it  is  provided  that 
when  a  decision  of  the  manager  is  not  satisfactory  to  the 
employees,  the  case  shall  go  to  outside  arbitration. 

In  the  United  States  Government,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  people  are  theoretically  supreme,  and  there  is  no 
veto  power  over  them.  Their  servants  may  not  obey 
them,  but  at  the  next  election  a  new  set  of  servants 
can  be  selected.  In  the  shop  committee  form  of  gov- 
ernment, the  employees  may,  of  course,  get  rid  of  repre- 
sentatives who  are  not  satisfactory,  and  the  manage- 
ment may  do  likewise  with  its  representatives.  But 
the  point  is  that  in  a  shop  committee  system  the  em- 
ployees have  nothing  to  say  about  the  selection  of  the 
representatives  of  the  management,  or  of  the  manager, 
who  is  practically  the  president,  with  veto  power;  nor 
has  the  management  anything  to  say  about  the  selection 
of  the  representatives  of  the  employees.  In  other 
words,  in  a  shop  committee  system  we  have  two  different 
elements  meeting  for  the  purpose  of  adjusting  and  bar- 
gaining with  each  other. 

This  contrast  may  be  seen  more  clearly  by  comparing 
the  shop  committee  form  of  government  to  the  govern- 
ment of  a  genuinely  cooperative  industry  in  which  the 
workers  have  a  direct  voice  in  the  management  because 
they  are  part  owners  of  the  enterprise. 

These  remarks  do  not  necessarily  throw  discredit  on 
the  shop  committee  theory.  They  are  intended  merely 
to  make  clear  exactly  what  kind  of  a  government  the 
shop  committee  sets  up,  its  advantages  and  its  limita- 
tions. 


24  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

"  Voice  in  the  Management  " 

The  phrase  "  voice  in  the  management "  applies  to 
every  well  worked  out  shop  committee  system.  "  Joint 
control/'  as  explained  above,  is  a  misnomer.  "  Partner- 
ship," writes  W.  L.  MacKenzie  King  on  this  point, 
"  is  essentially  a  matter  of  status.  It  does  not  involve 
identity  or  similarity  of  function  on  the  part  of  the 
partners,  or  equality  of  either  service  or  rewards;  but  it 
does  imply  equality,  as  respects  the  right  of  representa- 
tion, in  the  determination  of  policy  on  matters  of  com- 
mon interest." 

Let  us  now  see,  within  the  limits  just  explained, 
what  sort  of  a  system  of  government  the  shop  com- 
mittee establishes.  In  other  words,  what  are  the 
branches  of  this  form  of  government,  what  is  its  legisla- 
ture, its  court,  its  executive  ? 

The  "  people  "  who  are  to  set  up  this  government  are 
in  two  groups  —  employees  and  employers.  So  far  as 
the  employees'  side  is  concerned,  the  people  are  all  em- 
ployees without  regard  to  age,  sex,  or  condition  of  em- 
ployment. If  the  system  is  to  be  truly  representative, 
it  must  not  disfranchise  any  employee,  no  matter 
whether  he  or  she  is  an  elevator  man,  a  clerk,  a  scrub- 
woman, or  a  highly  paid  mechanic.  But  just  as  in  the 
American  government  it  is  necessary  to  define  the 
qualifications  of  the  voter,  so  in  a  shop  committee  sys- 
tem it  is  necessary  to  define  what  an  employee  is. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  all  the  men  and  women,  with 
one  or  two  possible  exceptions,  who  work  in  a  modern 
American  factory  are  employees.  Unless  the  manager 
is  also  an  owner,  he  is  an  employee :  and  so  are  his 
assistants  from  the  general  office  down  the  line  to  the 
superintendents,  foremen  and  leading  hands.  But  for 
the  purposes  of  shop  committee  government,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  divide  employees  into  two  classes,  that  which 
represents  the  management,  and  that  which  consists  of 


25 

the  rank  and  file  of  the  workers.  Therefore  it  is  cus- 
tomary to  disqualify  from  voting  and  participating  in 
the  employees'  side  of  the  system  all  those  who  have 
administrative  duties.  This  commonly  includes  those 
who  are  employed  in  a  supervisory  capacity,  and  hence 
shuts  out  the  manager  and  his  staff,  and  the  fore- 
men and  leading  hands.  The  reason  for  this  is  self- 
evident. 

In  addition,  it  is  usual  to  fix  an  age  limit,  say  21 
years ;  to  require  that  voters  shall  be  American  citizens, 
and  so  on.  These  details  are  discussed  at  some  length 
in  Chapter  VII. 

The  general  principle  here  is,  within  the  limits  of  cus- 
tom and  common  sense,  to  allow  every  employee  to  vote. 

Shop  Committees  —  Their  Functions 

The  "  people  "  having  been  defined,  we  now  come  to 
the  first  branch  of  the  shop  committee  system,  which  is 
usually  the  shop  committee  itself.  By  its  very  name, 
this  is  a  committee  of  the  shop,  that  is  to  say,  it  repre- 
sents a  shop,  department  or  division  of  the  plant.  The 
plant,  therefore,  must  be  divided  or  districted  just  as  a 
city  is  districted  into  wards  each  of  which  selects  its 
members  of  the  common  council.  The  details  of  this 
process  of  districting  are  considered  fully  in  Chapter 
IV.  The  general  principle  here  is  that  every  representa- 
tive system  of  government  requires  some  device  to  insure 
that  an  elected  representative  actually  represents  the 
people  who  elected  him,  and  that  no  other  people  or 
voters  shared  in  that  electing.  Thus  each  district  or 
shop  in  a  plant  determines  for  itself  the  members  of 
its  committee,  which  is  the  first  branch  of  the  system 
of  government. 

The  duty  of  the  employee  members  of  a  shop  com- 
mittee is  to  act  as  mediators  or  adjusters  of  disputes 
arising  in  their  district  between  the  employees  and  the 


26  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

foremen:  to  sit  in  session  with  the  employer  members 
of  the  committee  as  (1)  a  mediating  and  adjusting 
committee,  and  (2)  as  a  court  to  hear  and  pass  on 
cases  coming  before  it.  These  duties  are  more  fully  de- 
tailed in  later  chapters. 

The  second  branch  of  the  shop  committee  system  is 
what  is  termed  in  the  standard  plan  of  the  War  Labor 
Board,  the  "  General  Works  Committee/'  This  com- 
mittee is  higher  in  authority  than  the  shop  committees 
and  has  broader  powers.  It  may  be  composed  (1) 
of  all  the  shop  committee  members,  (2)  of  a  fraction  of 
the  shop  committee  members,  or,  (3)  of  employees  at 
large,  not  shop  committee  members.  It  is  usually 
elected  by  the  members  of  the  shop  committees  them- 
selves, but  it  may  be  elected  at  a  popular  election  in 
which  all  employees  participate. 

The  duty  of  a  General  Committee  may  be,  (1)  to 
sit  as  a  court  of  appeals  in  matters  coming  up  from 
the  shop  committees;  (2)  to  act  as  a  mediating  and 
adjusting  body  between  the  whole  body  of  employees  and 
the  management;  (3)  to  make  rules  and  regulations 
to  govern  elections  and  procedure. 

In  some  existing  shop  committee  systems,  the  duty 
described  under  (3)  is  handled  by  a  separate  committee 
on  rules.  As  will  be  seen  later,  there  may  be  more 
than  one  general  committee,  though  it  is  usual  to  have 
but  one  charged  with  the  duties  enumerated  under  (1) 
and  (2). 

The  General  Works  Committee,  no  matter  whether 
called  the  Appeals  Committee,  the  General  Joint  Com- 
mittee, or  the  General  Adjustment  Board,  is,  after  all, 
the  supreme  joint  council  of  employer  and  employee. 
It  is  a  judicial  council  when  it  decides  cases  which  come 
up  on  appeal.  It  is  a  legislative  council  when  it  decides 
on  rules  and  regulations,  wage  rates,  bonuses,  and  other 
matters  affecting  conditions  of  employment.  It  is  also 


GENERAL  PRINCIPLES  27 

an  advisory  body  or  kind  of  cabinet  to  the  General 
Manager,  when,  as  frequently  occurs,  it  brings  to  his 
attention  situations  or  complaints  which  might  other- 
wise escape  his  notice.  It  is  not  an  executive  body 
for  the  reason  that  the  execution  or  administration  of 
its  decisions  and  recommendations  is  the  function  of  the 
management. 

The  Management's  Side 

Looking  at  the  other  half  of  this  system  of  govern- 
ment, we  find  that  the  representatives  of  the  manage- 
ment are,  first  of  all,  appointed  instead  of  elected. 
The  reason  for  their  selection  by  appointment  instead 
of  election  is  that  the  management  is  one  thing,  usually 
one  person  or  one  small  group  of  persons  with  a  single 
head.  The  management  chooses  its  representatives  from 
those  employees  who  are  not  "  people  "  as  defined  above, 
that  is  to  say,  from  its  assistants,  superintendents, 
department  or  division  heads,  general  foremen,  foremen, 
leading  hands,  and  often  cost  clerks  or  paymasters. 

To  deal  with  the  individual  employee  the  manage- 
ment selects  foremen  or  leading  hands.  To  represent 
the  management's  half  of  the  joint  shop  committees, 
foremen  again  are  generally  chosen.  To  represent  the 
management's  half  of  a  general  committee,  assistant 
managers,  or  department  heads  are  usually  selected. 
In  some  plants  the  management  employs  a  special  agent, 
often  called  "  the  industrial  representative  "  who  reports 
directly  to  the  manager  and  who  attends  without  vote 
the  committee  meetings  so  as  to  keep  in  constant  touch 
with  the  workings  of  the  plan  of  representation. 

Thus  we  see  that  the  shop  committee  system  is  a 
system  of  government  composed  of  a  series  of  commit- 
tees with  duties  which  differ  but  slightly,  and  which 
is  organized  and  operated  on  the  principle  that  as  far 
as  is  practicable  the  relations  between  employer  and 


28  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

employee  should  be  adjusted  by  common  counsel  at  joint 
meetings  of  accredited  representatives  of  each  side. 

The  joint  meeting  is  the  characteristic  thing  about 
the  shop  committee  form  of  industrial  government.  It 
is  more  than  characteristic,  it  is  fundamntal.  The  entire 
purpose  of  shop  committee  systems  is  to  bring  em- 
ployer and  employee  together  face  to  face.  To  the 
minds  of  some  keen  employers  and  employees  this  move- 
ment means  a  return  of  the  "  good  old  days "'  when 
industry  was  small  and  the  general  manager  personally 
knew  Tom  Jones  in  the  foundry  and  dealt  with  him 
man  to  man,  instead  of  through  the  medium  of  half 
a  hundred  subordinates.  How  to  reestablish  this  kind 
of  relationship  in  modern  industry  has  been  a  problem 
which  has  puzzled  many  of  the  leaders  in  the  world  of 
labor  as  well  as  in  the  world  of  capital.  At  a  critical 
time  in  the  history  of  industry  throughout  the  world, 
the  shop  committee  offers  itself  as  a  solution  of  this 
problem.  By  setting  up  a  simple  plan  of  internal  shop 
government  on  the  principles  just  outlined,  something 
of  the  old  small  shop  atmosphere  can  be  regained. 
The  sense  of  aloofness  between  employer  and  employee 
vanishes  when  the  manager  realizes  that  his  responsible 
agents  are  meeting  daily  with  the  men  in  committee 
sessions;  and  when  the  men,  for  their  part,  realize  that 
the  management  believes  that  the  rank  and  file  should 
have  a  say  in  the  way  the  business  is  managed. 

Cooperation 

But  if  a  shop  committee  system  is  to  be  a  success,  it 
must  be  based  on  one  other  fundamental  principle  in  ad- 
dition to  those  already  mentioned.  This  is  that  from 
the  very  beginning  a  shop  committee  system  must  be  a 
matter  of  cooperation.  From  the  start  it  is  essential 
that  men  and  management  should  come  together  as 
nearly  as  possible  on  an  equal  footing  and  from  that 


GENERAL  PRINCIPLES  29 

footing  thresh  out  their  problems  with  the  utmost  good 
nature  and  frankness.  The  management  may  feel  that 
it  possesses  superior  wisdom,  but  it  need  not  exhibit  this 
feeling.  The  men  may  feel  that  the  management  is 
trying  to  "  slip  one  over  "  on  them,  but  they  ought  to 
go  in  and  use  their  brains  and  reason  the  matter  out. 
In  one  great  industrial  plant  in  the  United  States  the 
shop  committee  system  failed  because  it  was  devised 
solely  by  the  management  and  offered  to  the  employees 
as  a  charity.  In  another  factory  a  shop  committee  sys- 
tem nearly  fell  to  pieces  because  the  unions  misunder- 
stood it  and  counselled  a  policy  of  "knocking."  And 
in  a  third  plant  both  sides  got  together  on  common 
ground  from  the  beginning  and  out  of  two  quite  dif- 
ferent schemes,  worked  a  new  one  which  both  declared 
to  be  preferable  to  either  of  the  originals.  Unless  the 
basic  principle  be  adopted  that  a  shop  committee  sys- 
tem must  be  planned,  established  and  operated  collec- 
tively, it  is  as  well  to  have  none  at  all. 

All  government,  we  are  told,  rests  on  the  consent  of 
the  governed.  A  shop  committee  system  of  government 
is  no  exception  to  this  rule. 

I  emphasize  this  point  for  the  reason  that  experience 
has  shown  it  to  be  a  vital  one.  The  shop  committee 
movement  is  in  reality  a  part  of  the  organized  labor 
movement.  If  it  is  properly  guided  in  the  early  years 
of  its  life  it  may  prove  to  be  a  solution  of  many  of  the 
most  vexing  problems  which  confront  the  labor  move- 
ment. The  shop  committee  means  in  principle,  not  the 
recognition  of  the  union,  but  the  recognition  of  the 
fact  that  it  is  more  efficient  both  for  employer  and  em- 
ployee to  handle  their  daily,  intimate  problems  collec- 
tively instead  of  in  the  old  way,  individually.  If  then, 
an  employer  is  to  deal  collectively  with  representative 
groups  of  his  employees,  it  is  essential  that  the  desires 
of  the  employees  should  be  made  known  and  should  be 


30  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

given  at  least  equal  weight  with  those  of  the  employer. 

Some  students  of  the  shop  committee  go  further  than 
this  and  maintain  that  the  employees  are  the  sole  judge 
in  the  matter  of  districting  and  determining  represen- 
tation. Two  heads  are,  however,  generally  wiser  than 
one,  and  inasmuch  as  shop  committee  government  is 
after  all  joint  government,  joint  counsel  should  be  held. 
But  experience  has  also  shown  that  no  shop  committee 
system  introduced  and  put  into  operation  by  a  manage- 
ment which  considers  itself  morally  or  intellectually 
the  superior  of  the  men  has  ever  really  succeeded. 

These  are  the  main  principles  of  shop  committee 
government.  The  list  is  not  complete.  For  example, 
it  is  also  an  important  principle  that  in  the  elections  of 
shop  committees  the  management  should  refrain  from 
even  an  appearance  of  supervision.  It  should,  of 
course,  be  reasonably  assured  that  the  elections  are 
fair  and  free  and  open  only  to  employees,  and  a  joint 
committee  of  men  and  management  might  well  agree 
on  the  rules  governing  the  elections.  But  the  elections 
are  primarily  the  business  of  the  employees,  just  as  the 
appointment  of  the  representatives  of  the  management 
is  primarily  the  business  of  the  management.  Another 
principle,  discussed  in  detail  in  Chapter  VIII,  is  that 
the  spirit  of  the  shop  committee  system  must  be  entirely 
democratic;  there  should  be  the  initiative,  the  referen- 
dum and  the  recall ;  the  records  of  all  committees  should 
be  open  and  public  to  employees  desiring  to  consult 
them ;  and  the  system  itself  must  be  easy  to  amend  after 
due  consideration  by  both  parties. 

If  a  shop  committee  system  is  founded  on  the  prin- 
ciple outlined  in  this  chapter  and  if  it  is  motivated, 
above  all,  by  the  principle  of  genuine  cooperation  — 
not  the  kind  of  cooperation  which  means  benevolent 
paternalism  —  it  can  be  built  in  such  a  way  as  to  out- 
last the  lives  of  the  men  who  helped  to  erect  it. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  BASIS  OF   REPRESENTATION 

THE  first  step  in  the  practical  application  of  the  gen- 
eral principles  of  shop  committee  government  is  to  di- 
vide the  plant  into  shops,  sections,  districts,  or  depart- 
ments. This  should  be  done  jointly  by  a  committee  of 
employees  meeting  with  representatives  of  the  manage- 
ment. In  order  to  secure  a  successful  districting,  it  is 
necessary  that  this  committee  should  be  familiar  with 
the  geography  of  the  plant  and  with  the  various  kinds 
of  work  done  throughout  the  plant.  A  successful  job 
of  districting  will  almost  certainly  insure  a  successful 
working  plan,  the  reason  being  that  a  fair  and  just 
districting  provides  a  fair  and  just  basis  of  represen- 
tation, a  thing  that  is  fundamental  to  the  entire  system. 

Districting  involves  three  factors:  (1)  the  actual  lo- 
cation and  size  of  the  district;  (2)  the  size  of  the  com- 
mittee or  number  of  representatives  of  the  workers; 
(3)  the  craft  or  occupation  of  the  workers  to  be  in- 
cluded in  the  district. 

In  the  Pittsfield  award  of  the  War  Labor  Board 
(see  Chapter  II),  nothing  was  said  about  districting 
the  plant.  The  Board  assumed  that  the  plant  was  al- 
ready divided  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  re-division  un- 
necessary. As  a  matter  of  fact,  some  fifty  departments 
had  long  been  recognized  in  the  Pittsfield  Works  as 
separate  shops  or  departments,  and  there  was  no  great 
demand  for  revising  this  arrangement.  There  was, 
however,  some  sharp  difference  of  opinion  between  men 
and  management  as  to  whether  certain  departments 

31 


32  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

should  be  combined  before  choosing  a  committee,  and 
as  at  that  time  the  general  principles  of  districting  were 
not  clearly  understood  and  agreed  on,  the  result  was  a 
more  or  less  unsatisfactory  compromise.  I  mention  this 
fact  because  it  indicates  an  error  which  can  easily  be 
avoided. 

Size  of  Constituency 

Within  a  few  weeks  the  Board  had  issued  its  stand- 
ardized shop  committee  plan.  Under  the  heading 
"  Number  of  Committeemen  "  this  plan  declared : 

"  Each  department  or  section,  of  the  shop  shall  be  entitled 
to  one  committeeman  for  each  hundred  employees  employed 
in  the  department  or  section.  If,  in  any  department  or  sec- 
tion, there  shall  be  employees  in  excess  of  any  even  hundred, 
then  an  additional  committeeman  may  be  selected,  provided 
the  additional  employees  beyond  the  even  hundred  shall  be 
more  than  fifty.  If  less  than  fifty,  no  additional  representa- 
tive shall  be  allowed.  As  an  example:  in  a  department  or 
section  employing  330  men,  3  committeemen  will  be  elected. 
In  a  department  employing  375,  4  committeemen  will  be 
elected." 

In  another  paragraph  this  plan  declared : 

"  In  order  to  insure  workable  committees  of  not  less  than  3 
or  more  than  5,  examiners  can  either  subdivide  the  plant  into 
sections  of  not  less  than  250  nor  more  than  500  employees." 

In  a  memorandum  of  instructions  issued  at  this  time, 
the  Board  said  that  its  standard  plan  was  not  intended 
to  fix  hard  and  fast  rules,  and  that  the  basis  of  repre- 
sentation might  well  vary  from  the  numbers  just  given. 
"No  injustice  results  from  such  variations,"  was  the 
statement,  "inasmuch  as  these  shop  committees  deal 
directly  on  behalf  of  their  constituents  with  foremen 
and  other  representatives  of  the  management."  In 
other  words,  the  sound  principle  was  set  forth  that  it  is 
not  at  all  necessary  that  the  actual  number  of  em- 


THE  BASIS  OF  KEPRESENTATION        33 

ployees  in  each  shop  or  district  should  be  the  same. 
Each  shop  is  an  independent  political  unit,  so  far  as 
its  own  business  is  concerned,  and  its  size  should  be 
determined  not  for  numerical  reasons,  but  in  accordance 
with  geographical  and  craft  conditions. 

In  applying  this  theory  in  industrial  plants,  however, 
it  is  generally  found  to  be  wise  to  decide  on  a  limit, 
such  as  100,  as  a  rough  basis  of  representation.  This 
limit  is  not  a  fixed  one,  and  the  number  of  employees 
in  a  separate  shop  or  department  runs  all  the  way  from 
50  or  even  less  to  400  or  500. 

Craft  vs.  Geographical  Basis 

Once  this  flexible  limit  is  settled,  the  question  arises: 
What  shall  be  the  character  of  each  unit  or  shop? 
Shall  it  be  geographical  or  occupational,  or  both  ? 

This  is  a  highly  important  question,  and  there  is  room 
for  a  large  variety  of  answers  to  it.  From  the  point 
of  view  of  some  managers,  an  employee  is  an  employee 
regardless  of  the  nature  of  his  work,  and  all  that  is 
necessary  in  order  to  give  him  representation  is  to 
allow  him  freely  to  vote  for  candidates  taken  from 
among  his  neighbors  in  the  plant.  The  point  of  view 
of  the  average  employee,  on  the  other  hand,  is,  that  an 
employee  is  above  everything  a  worker  at  some  particular 
kind  of  a  job,  and  that  in  order  to  have  real  repre- 
sentation he  must  choose  a  committee  which  has  direct 
knowledge  of  the  job.  These  opposite  views  may  be 
illustrated  by  an  actual  case: 

In  a  certain  factory  it  was  proposed  to  group  about 
seventy-five  skilled  machinists,  about  one  hundred 
operatives  on  semi-skilled  repetition  work,  and  about 
one  hundred  and  fifty  construction  laborers  together  and 
give  them  a  shop  committee.  The  management  argued 
that  all  these  workers  were  housed  in  the  same  wing 
of  one  building,  and  that  a  committee  of  three,  one 


34  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

from  each  group,  could  handle  their  business.  The 
repetition  workers  and  the  construction  laborers  were 
agreeable  to  this  proposal,  but  the  skilled  machinists 
objected  because  they  were  a  distinct,  trained  craft  with 
peculiar  craft  problems  which,  they  declared,  could  not 
well  be  handled  by  other  craftsmen.  In  the  end  the 
machinists  got  a  separate  committee  of  their  own,  while 
the  other  two  groups  were  consolidated  into  another 
single  constituency. 

The  problem  is  always  a  complicated  one,  and  no  hard 
and  fast  rule  should  be  laid  down.  Perhaps  the  best 
general  rule  is  that  of  the  War  Labor  Board :  "  The 
committees  shall  be  not  only  of  manageable  size  .  .  . 
but  shall  give  definite  proportional  representation  to 
as  many  occupational  or  other  natural  groups,  includ- 
ing women,  as  may  be  possible.  .  .  .  While  it  is  mani- 
festly impossible  for  every  minor  occupation  or  minor 
department  to  be  represented  upon  shop  committees,  it 
is  possible  to  do  justice  in  every  case,  provided  the 
local  situation  is  understood,  and  only  when  it  is  under- 
stood." 

The  matter  of  the  size  of  the  committee  is  not  so 
difficult.  The  War  Labor  Board  followed  common  cus- 
tom in  this  regard  when  it  recommended  that  the  com- 
mittees be  not  less  than  three  nor  more  than  five.  Even 
when  a  shop  or  district  contains  as  few  as  fifty  em- 
ployees, a  committee  of  three  is  not  too  large.  Shop 
committee  work  is  hard  work  and  requires  careful  atten- 
tion. If  less  than  three  are  chosen,  the  burden  of  repre- 
sentation will  fall  heavily  on  the  one  or  two  mem- 
bers and  will  require  their  frequent  absence  from 
work  to  make  investigations  and  adjust  cases.  This 
means  loss  of  time  and  often  of  earnings  to  the  em- 
ployees, and  a  corresponding  loss  in  production  to  the 
company. 

So  far  we  have  analyzed  the  basis  of  representation 


THE  BASIS  OF  REPRESENTATION        35 

only  as  it  involves  the  shop  committees.     Let  us  now 
look  at  it  as  it  involves  the  general  committee. 

General  Committees 

A  general  committee  is  a  legislative  and  judicial 
body  which  spends  most  of  its  time  on  appeals  from 
shop  committees  or  else  on  general  questions  which 
affect  the  entire  plant.  Since  a  general  committee  repre- 
sents the  entire  plant,  the  problem  of  districting  so  far 
as  it  is  concerned,  comes  down  to  a  single  question: 
Should  the  members  of  this  committee  be  chosen  to 
represent  different  large  sections  or  divisions  of  the 
plant,  or  should  they  be  chosen  from  the  employees 
regardless  of  where  located  ? 

As  a  rule  there  is  not  much  difficulty  in  reaching  a 
satisfactory  decision  on  this  point.  It  is  obvious  that 
a  general  committee  should  have  general  knowledge 
or  experience,  and  it  therefore  usually  results  in  prac- 
tice, no  matter  whether  a  specific  rule  is  adopted  or 
not,  that  the  members  are  actually  chosen  from  the 
different  parts  of  the  works.  In  Pittsfield,  for  example, 
the  election  rules  required  that  the  three  main  divisions 
should  each  choose  one  member  of  the  Appeals  Com- 
mittee. In  Bridgeport,  for  another  example,  the  Em- 
ployees General  Committee  is  composed  of  the  chair- 
men of  all  the  department  committees,  and  therefore 
automatically  represents  each  section. 

Another  and  more  fundamental  question  is,  Who  shall 
elect  the  members  of  the  general  committee,  and  who 
is  eligible  for  nomination  thereto?  In  the  case  of  the 
shop  committee,  all  the  inhabitants  of  the  shop,  so  to 
speak,  elect  the  committee,  and  none  but  workers  in 
that  shop  are  eligible  to  membership.  With  the  general 
committee  a  different  situation  arises. 

In  the  standard  plan  of  the  War  Labor  Board,  the 
General  Works  Committee  is  described  as  being  "com- 


36  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

posed  of  the  several  shop  committees  representing  the 
departments  or  sections  of  the  plant.  Thus,  a  single 
election  in  a  department  provides  both  a  shop  committee, 
as  such,  and  a  portion  of  the  Works  Committee,  which 
will  be  formed  by  the  coming  together  of  all  the  various 
shop  committees."  This  theory,  in  other  words,  is  that 
the  shop  committee  is  really  a  part  of  the  general  com- 
mittee, and  that  all  members  of  the  general  committee 
are  members  of  the  shop  committees.  As  we  have 
seen,  this  theory  was  put  into  practice  in  the  Bridge- 
port munition  plants,  where  the  general  committee  is 
composed  of  the  chairmen  of  the  shop  committees. 
Thus  one  answer  to  the  question  put  in  the  last  par- 
agraph is  that  the  members  of  the  general  committee 
may  be  elected  by  the  shops,  each  shop  voting  separately, 
and  that  only  shop  committeemen  may  be  eligible  for 
membership  on  the  general  committee. 

But  is  this  a  satisfactory  answer  ?  Is  it  a  democratic 
and  truly  representative  method  of  forming  a  govern- 
ment? If  the  general  committee  is  to  be  an  appeals 
committee,  which  must  necessarily  be  the  case,  should 
it  be  composed  of  employees  who  are  members  of  lower 
committees,  and  who  are  therefore  placed  in  the  position 
of  reviewing  on  appeal  cases  which  they  have  already 
decided?  I  ask  this  question  not  because  there  is  any 
ready-made  solution  for  it:  shop  committee  government 
is  too  new  an  experiment  to  permit  dogmatism.  But  in 
some  shop  committee  plans,  as  for  example,  the  Lynn 
and  Pittsfield  plans,  the  members  of  the  General  Joint 
Committee  on  Adjustment  and  the  Appeals  Committee, 
respectively,  are  not  members  of  shop  committees.  They 
are  selected  from  the  employees  at  large,  and  are  elected 
by  the  members  of  the  shop  committees,  who  meet  in 
a  special  convention  for  that  purpose.  None  but  mem- 
bers of  the  shop  committees  can  nominate  for  members 
of  the  general  committees. 


THE  BASTS  OF  REPRESENTATION        37 

Election  Metlwds 

In  some  minds  there  will  arise  a  doubt  as  to  the 
wisdom  of  holding  a  popular  election  for  the  members 
of  a  general  committee.  If  the  general  committee  is  to 
represent  all  the  employees  of  the  plant,  however,  why 
should  not  all  the  employees  in  the  plant  have  the  oppor- 
tunity to  make  nominations  and  to  cast  ballots  ?  Should 
this  not  be  the  case  particularly  where  the  members  of 
the  general  committee  are  taken  from  the  rank  and  file 
of  the  workers?  The  issue  is  in  reality  between  direct 
and  indirect  elections,  between  the  original  method,  for 
example,  of  choosing  a  United  States  Senator  through 
the  legislature,  and  the  present  method  of  choosing  him 
by  the  popular  vote  of  his  State.  It  may  be  said, 
however,  that  if  the  election  rules  and  procedure  in- 
clude the  recall,  the  matter  of  voting  indirectly  is 
obviously  of  less  importance  than  otherwise. 

Without  end  are  the  devices  which  have  been  and 
which  will  be  suggested  to  secure  a  fair  and  equitable 
basis  of  representation  of  employees  on  shop  and  general 
committees.  One  interesting  device  suggested  by  the 
War  Labor  Board  for  the  selection  by  a  general  com- 
mittee of  an  appeals  committee  is  this : 

"  In  such  balloting  each  General  Works  Committee  member 
shall  cast  as  many  votes  as  the  total  number  of  employees 
whom  he  represents.  Thus,  if  Ihere  are  five  committeemen 
from  a  certain  machine  shop  where  17,500  men  are  employed, 
each  of  the  five  will  have  a  voting  strength  of  350;  a  commit- 
tee of  3  from  the  pattern  makers'  department  of  say  420  men 
would  each  have  140  votes  in  the  General  Works  Committee. 
This  arrangement  gives  fair  representation  all  around,  and 
permits  the  working  parts  of  the  collective  bargaining  ma- 
chinery, namely,  the  shop  committees  and  subdivisions  of  the 
General  Works  Committee,  to  fit  the  actual  departmental,  craft 
or  other  needs  which  they  are  intended  to  fill." 

This  suggestion  brings  us  directly  to  the  matter  of 
the  size  of  general  committees.  Custom  differs  accord- 


38 

ing  to  the  character  of  the  general  committee  or  com- 
mittees to  be  selected.  In  Bridgeport  they  vary  from 
three  to  nine,  depending  on  the  size  of  the  plant. 
Elsewhere,  five  is  a  common  number,  though  it  is  not 
unusual  to  have  an  even  number,  as  four  or  six.  The 
principle  to  be  followed  is  that  a  general  committee 
must  be  neither  too  cumbersome  nor  too  "light."  It 
must  not  be  too  large  to  be  unable  to  do  business  effi- 
ciently, and  it  must  be  large  enough  to  be  able  to  do 
business  in  the  absence  of  two  or  three  members. 

To  sum  up  in  outline  the  main  points  thus  far  covered : 

Basis  of  Representation  — 

1.  Shop  Committees  —  districting. 

a.  Size  and  location  of  shops. 

b.  Craft  or  occupational  character. 

c.  Size  of  committees. 

2.  General  Committees. 

a.  Eligibility. 

b.  Direct  or  indirect  election. 

c.  Size. 

Underlying  all  that  has  been  said  concerning  the 
basis  of  representation  is  the  important  fact  that  what 
is  a  fair  basis  of  representation  in  one  plant  may  be 
unfair  in  another.  Local  conditions  must  always  be 
considered  in  applying  general  principles,  and  the  com- 
mon mistake  of  trying  to  use  a  ready-made  form  which 
was  designed  to  meet  a  different  problem  must  be 
avoided.  What  will  really  determine  the  final  plan  of 
a  system  of  representation  will  be  the  peculiar  character 
of  the  industry.  In  a  certain  small  factory,  for  example, 
there  are  about  two  hundred  employees.  A  strict  craft 
grouping  of  these  employees  suggested  that  there  should 
be  eight  committees.  But  the  fact  that  the  entire  plant 
was  contained  in  one  building  resulted  in  a  plan  call- 


THE  BASIS  OF  REPRESENTATION        39 

ing  for  one  committee  of  four,  each  member  representing 
both  a  craft  or  crafts  and  a  geographical  area. 

Again,  in  a  certain  street  railway  organization,  there 
was  a  natural  division  into  five  departments.  These 
natural  divisions,  further,  had  branches  which  were 
promptly  made  into  "  shops  "  electing  shop  committee- 
men  and  men  to  serve  on  the  department  committees, 
two  from  each  department  committee  later  being  selected 
to  serve  on  the  general  committee.  Here  the  numbers 
of  the  employees  in  the  different  districts  was  not  as 
important  a  factor  as  the  divisions  themselves,  which 
had  long  been  in  existence,  ready  to  be  adapted  to  the 
new  purpose. 

Task  of  Management 

It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  the  management  has 
to  perform  a  task  of  equal  importance  with  the  task 
of  agreeing  on  a  basis  of  representation.  The  em- 
ployees' side  of  a  shop  committee  system  is  only  half 
of  the  system,  though  it  is  the  more  difficult  half  to 
plan.  The  management  must  reorganize  itself  in  order 
to  deal  with  the  organization  of  the  workers.  It  must 
designate  its  members  of  shop  and  general  committees. 
Its  basis  of  representation  will  largely  follow  that 
adopted  for  the  employees:  in  the  majority  of  cases 
it  will  be  a  combination  of  geographical  and  craft,  that 
is  to  say,  the  foremen,  cost  clerks,  leading  hands,  and  so 
on,  chosen  to  sit  on  joint  shop  committees  or  to  deal 
with  representatives  of  the  workers  must  have  direct 
knowledge  of  the  work  of  the  particular  shop,  and 
should  be  located  in  that  shop.  In  addition,  they  must 
possess  a  large  share  of  tact  and  discretion,  together 
with  ready  willingness  to  "  play  the  game  "  in  accord- 
ance with  the  new  rules.  Adequate  representation  of 
management  is  as  necessary  as  adequate  representation 
of  men. 


40  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

The  districting  of  a  plant  brings  to  a  head  and  focus 
all  the  most  vital  problems  in  shop  committee  govern- 
ment. A  perfect  basis  of  representation  is  probably  an 
unattainable  ideal.  But  a  satisfactory  basis  of  repre- 
sentation can  be  reached  if  the  joint  committee  comes 
to  the  task  in  the  right  spirit  and  takes  as  its  guide 
the  principles  which  have  been  worked  out  in  the  labora- 
tory of  experience,  remembering  always  that,  like  any 
system  of  government,  a  shop  committee  system  is  sub- 
ject to  change  and  needed  revision. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   LYNN   PLAN 

THE  Lynn  (Massachusetts)  Works  of  the  General  Elec- 
tric Company  has  in  operation  at  the  present  time  a  plan 
of  representation  which  was  worked  out  in  joint  con- 
ference between  employer  and  employee  and  the  writer, 
acting  as  administrator  for  the  National  War  Labor 
Board.  This  plan  thus  far  has  been  a  pronounced 
success.  A  description  of  it  with  particular  reference 
to  the  basis  of  representation,  will  serve  to  illustrate 
the  points  taken  up  in  the  last  chapter. 

This  plant  is  one  of  the  largest  of  a  series  of  more 
than  a  dozen  factory  groups  located  in  various  parts  of 
the  United  States.  It  turns  out  a  great  variety  of  elec- 
trical apparatus,  and  one  of  the  buildings  at  Lynn  is 
the  largest  single  building  in  the  world  devoted  to  the 
manufacture  of  electric  motors.  The  Lynn  plant  has  a 
ground  area  of  200  acres;  there  are  3,000,000  square 
feet  of  floor  space,  and  the  employees  number  between 
10,000  and  12,000.  The  trades  represented  include 
most  of  the  "  regular  "  trades,  such  as  pattern  making, 
die-cutting,  skilled  machine  work,  carpentry,  blacksmith- 
ing,  etc.  The  bulk  of  the  work,  however,  is  more  or 
less  special  in  its  nature  and  there  is  a  large  amount 
of  semi-skilled  repetition  work. 

Difficult  Districting  Problem 

The  problem  of  districting  the  Lynn  Works  was 
therefore  a  very  difficult  one.  Not  only  was  it  necessary 
to  give  adequate  representation  to  the  "  regular  "  trades, 

41 


42  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

but  it  was  also  necessary  to  divide  the  works  into  units 
of  government  which  would  insure  adequate  representa- 
tion for  the  various  groups  of  specialists,  whether  skilled, 
semi-skilled  or  unskilled.  In  spite  of  the  fact  that  in 
this  plant,  as  everywhere  in  the  modern  industrial 
world,  the  old  craft  lines  had  largely  broken  down, 
there  was  nevertheless  a  strong  feeling  on  the  part 
of  considerable  numbers  of  the  employees  that  they 
should  be  represented  by  men  who  had  first-hand  knowl- 
edge of  their  particular  jobs. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  joint  discussion  the  manage- 
ment presented  a  plan  which  called  for  one  representa- 
tive for  each  one  hundred  employees,  irrespective  of 
occupation.  At  the  same  time  the  employee  members 
of  the  committee  placed  their  emphasis  on  craft  repre- 
sentation for  the  reasons  above  stated. 

A  building  map  of  the  works  was  made  and  used 
to  guide  the  discussion.  This  map  showed  the  location 
of  each  building  and  was  supplemented  by  memoranda 
which  set  forth  the  nature  of  the  work  in  each  building 
and  floor.  Some  idea  of  the  task  which  the  joint  com- 
mittee performed  may  be  gained  from  the  fact  that  the 
conferences  over  the  basis  of  representation  alone  occu- 
pied more  than  a  week  of  daily  sessions. 

It  was  first  agreed  that  the  rough  numerical  basis  of 
representation  should  be  200  employees.  It  was  next 
agreed  that  each  group  of  200,  to  be  called  a  "  section/' 
should  elect  two  representatives.  Up  to  this  point  the 
question  of  the  character  and  location  of  the  sections  or 
units  had  not  been  determined. 

Craft-geographical  Basis 

With  the  approximate  size  of  the  sections  fixed,  the 
committee  again  consulted  maps  and  memoranda  in 
the  attempt  to  find  a  common  ground  for  agreement 
as  to  character  and  location.  Hard  study  developed  the 


THE  LYNN  PLAN  43 

fact  that  it  was  possible  to  cut  the  plant  into  sections 
varying  in  size  from  75  to  365,  with  the  average  in 
the  neighborhood  of  200,  and  that  each  of  these  sections 
would  include  more  or  less  the  same  kind  of  work  and 
would,  in  addition,  lie  within  convenient  boundaries. 
In  other  words,  it  was  found  quite  feasible  to  adopt 
what  may  be  called  the  craft-geographical  basis  of  repre- 
sentation. For  example,  a  small  building  in  which  116 
employees  were  doing  machine  work  and  assembly  of  a 
new  type  of  apparatus  was  made  into  a  section.  The 
next  section  had  a  population  of  223  employees,  en- 
gaged in  tool-making  machine  manufacture,  small  punch 
press  and  die  work,  and  the  manufacture  of  arc  lamp 
electrodes.  It  was  found  on  careful  inquiry  that  two 
representatives  could  be  selected  from  this  group  who 
either  together  or  separately  would  have  knowledge  of 
the  two  main  branches  of  the  production. 

Another  section,  the  first  and  second  floors  of  one 
building,  included  150  employees  mainly  engaged  in 
light  winding  and  the  manufacture  of  meter  parts. 
The  cranemen,  wherever  located  about  the  plant,  were 
made  into  a  separate  section  for  wage  adjustment  only. 
The  truck  drivers  and  transportation  men  were  grouped 
with  the  employees  of  the  hospital  and  restaurant.  The 
reason  for  this  was  that  the  transportation  workers 
naturally  belonged  together,  while  the  restaurant  and 
hospital  workers  were  so  few  in  number  and  so  mis- 
cellaneous in  occupation  that  it  did  not  greatly  matter 
where  they  were  placed.  The  groups  which  demanded 
craft  representation  were  either  given  separate  treat- 
ment or  were  else  granted  special  committees  for  the 
adjustment  of  rates.  For  ordinary  grievances  they  were 
to  make  use  of  the  representatives  of  the  geographical 
section  in  which  they  were  employed. 

Throughout  the  days  of  these  discussions,  the  em- 
ployee members  of  the  committee  held  frequent  con- 


44  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

ferences  with  the  rank  and  file  of  the  works  and  reported 
to  the  employer  members  the  criticisms  and  suggestions 
thus  gathered.  This  contact  proved  to  be  of  great  value 
because  it  took  the  whole  plant  into  the  discussion,  and 
made  it  impossible  for  any  one  to  charge  that  the  plan 
was  a  "  company  plan,"  or  something  "  fixed  up "  as 
a  result  of  expediency  or  hasty  compromise. 

By  and  large,  the  sections,  which  were  the  units  of  the 
shop  committee  structure,  gave  representation  to  crafts 
or  to  similar  kinds  of  work.  They  also  represented  def- 
inite, compact  geographical  areas. 

Committee  on  Fair  Dealing 

At  this  stage  of  the  conference  it  became  necessary 
to  determine  what  relation  the  section  should  bear  to 
the  shop  committee.  Was  the  section  to  be  considered 
as  a  shop,  or  as  something  entirely  different?  The 
agreement  reached  was  as  follows : 

"  The  employees'  representatives  of  each  section  shall  consti- 
tute a  committee  on  fair  dealing  to  cooperate  with  the  man- 
agement in  fostering  just  and  harmonious  relations  between 
the  management  and  employees.  Any  matter  requiring  ad- 
justment, may,  in  the  first  instance,  be  referred  by  the  em- 
ployee affected  either  personally  or  with  one  or  both  of  the 
representatives  of  his  section,  to  the  foreman  of  the  work  on 
which  the  employee  is  engaged.  If  the  foreman  fails  to  ad- 
just satisfactorily  any  matter  referred  to  him,  it  shall  then 
be  reduced  to  writing  and  taken  up  by  the  joint  shop  com- 
mittee." 

In  other  words,  the  sectional  committee  on  fair  deal- 
ing was  composed,  so  far  as  the  employees  were  con- 
cerned, of  two  representatives  plus  the  employee  or  em- 
ployees having  a  grievance.  This  committee  was  to 
meet  with  the  foreman  immediately  in  charge  of  the 
job,  and  attempt  to  settle  the  case.  This  committee 
was  not  to  be  a  joint  committee  in  the  sense  that  it 
was  made  up  of  equal  numbers  of  workers  and  of 


THE  LYNN  PLAN  45 

representatives  of  the  management.  It  was  the  first 
step  in  the  collective  bargaining  scheme. 

The  next  higher  step,  as  may  be  gathered  from  the 
quotation,  is  the  joint  shop  committee. 

A  "  shop  "  in  the  Lynn  plan  is  a  group  of  sections. 
The  original  districting  of  the  plant  called  for  about 
fifty  sections.  After  the  sections  had  been  agreed  to, 
it  was  decided  to  bring  two,  three,  four  or  five  sections 
together  into  other  groups  called  "  shops."  The  shops 
thus  created  contain  sections  in  which,  as  far  as  possible, 
similar  or  allied  manufacture  is  being  carried  on,  and 
which,  in  addition,  are  located  either  in  the  same  build- 
ing or  in  adjacent  buildings.  Each  shop  has  a  com- 
mittee of  three  employees,  elected  by  the  representatives 
of  the  sections  of  the  shop  from  among  their  own  num- 
ber. A  total  of  twenty  shops  was  established. 

Shop  Committees 

Shop  No.  1,  for  example,  is  composed  of  section  11, 
with  223  employees,  located  in  the  small  buildings  A, 
B,  and  E,  plus  section  41,  with  116  employees,  located 
in  adjacent  building  D.  Section  11  is  devoted  to  tool- 
making  machine  manufacture,  small  punch  press  and 
die  work,  and  the  manufacture  of  small  arc  lamp 
electrodes.  In  Section  41  there  is  machine  work  and 
the  assembly  of  new  type  of  apparatus.  Shop  No.  1 
therefore  has  a  total  of  339  employees.  Four  repre- 
sentatives, organized  into  two  committees  on  fair  deal- 
ing, were  to  represent  these  two  sections  separately. 
The  four  representatives,  meeting  in  a  miniature  con- 
vention, elected  three  of  their  number  to  serve  as  the 
employees'  half  of  the  joint  shop  committee  for  Shop 
No.  1. 

This  system  was  carried  out  throughout  the  plant 
with  the  exception  of  a  few  special  sections  created 
for  wage  adjustment  only,  and  with  one  or  two  shop 


46 

committees  elected,  as  in  the  case  of  the  two  power 
plants,  directly  by  the  employees  themselves. 

In  the  Lynn  scheme  the  shop  committees  are  real 
joint  committees  —  three  elected  representatives  of  the 
men  and  three  appointed  representatives  of  the 
management.  Their  duties  as  agreed  to  are  to  take  up 
matters  referred  to  them  by  the  committees  on  fair 
dealing. 

"  If  the  foreman,"  declared  the  agreement,  "  fails  to  adjust 
satisfactorily  any  matter  referred  to  him,  it  shall  then  be 
reduced  to  writing  and  taken  up  by  the  joint  shop  committee. 
This  committee  shall  endeavor  finally  to  dispose  of  the  matter 
and  shall  be  at  liberty  to  adopt  such  means  as  are  necessary, 
including  the  calling  of  witnesses  by  either  side,  adequately  to 
ascertain  the  facts  and  render  a  fair  decision.  Should  the 
committee  reach  a  decision  satisfactory  to  the  employee  origi- 
nating the  matter,  or  should  the  committee  reach  a  unanimous 
decision  on  this  subject,  this  decision  shall  be  regarded  as 
terminating  the  matter." 

Up  to  this  point  in  the  Lynn  plan  the  representatives 
of  the  employees  handle  matters  at  issue  in  common 
counsel  with  the  management.  But  just  at  this  point 
the  agreement  called  for  a  step  which  gave  the  manage- 
ment one  more  opportunity  to  secure  an  adjustment 
before  the  case  went  to  the  appeals  or  general  commit- 
tee. "  Should  the  committee,"  declared  the  agreement 
again,  "  fail  satisfactorily  to  adjust  any  matter  referred 
to  it,  a  written  report  shall  be  made,  together  with  the 
recommendations  of  the  committee,  if  any,  and  this  re- 
port shall  be  submitted  to  the  department  head  or  manu- 
facturing engineer  for  his  action." 

It  must  be  explained  in  this  connection  that  in  the 
Lynn  Works  officials  with  the  title  of  department  head 
or  manufacturing  engineer  are  in  charge  of  large  sec- 
tions of  the  plant,  sections  comprising  several  shops. 
The  purpose  of  injecting  these  officials  into  the  system 
at  this  juncture  was  to  give  the  men  responsible  to 


THE  LYNN  PLAN  47 

» 

the  manager  for  the  conduct  of  these  groups  of  shops 
a  chance  to  review  cases  in  which  the  shop  committees 
reported  failure  to  agree.  It  was  not  considered  advis- 
able or  necessary  to  make  this  a  joint  review  for  the 
reason,  first,  that  it  was  expected  that  a  limited  number 
of  cases  would  come  up  beyond  the  shop  committees; 
and  second,  that  so  long  as  the  employees  had  the  right 
of  appeal  over  the  department  head  to  the  general 
committee,  there  could  be  no  injustice  in  discontinuing 
here  and  here  alone  the  joint  representation. 

General  Committees 

As  has  already  been  stated,  the  Lynn  plan  provided 
for  general  joint  committees,  the  most  important  of 
which,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  employees,  was  the 
general  joint  committee  on  adjustment.  The  original 
plan  provided  for  a  second  general  committee,  that 
on  routine,  procedure  and  elections  —  in  reality  a  rules 
committee.  Subsequently,  three  other  general  commit- 
tees were  authorized. 

The  general  joint  committee  on  adjustment  represents 
the  entire  works.  It  was  elected  by  the  representatives 
of  the  sections,  meeting  in  a  convention  called  for  the 
purpose.  Its  members  were  chosen  from  among  the 
employees  at  large,  no  representative  being  eligible 
thereto.  The  reason  for  this  was  that  the  committee 
was  essentially  a  court  of  last  appeals  on  which  it  was 
determined  no  one  should  sit  who  had  had  a  direct 
interest  in  any  case  that  might  come  before  it.  The 
routine,  procedure  and  elections  committee  was  also 
elected  by  the  representatives,  but  from  among  their 
own  number.  As  in  the  case  of  the  shop  committees, 
the  management  appointed  an  equal  number  of  represen- 
tatives to  sit  with  the  representatives  of  the  employees 
on  the  general  committees.  In  order  to  secure  geogra- 
phical representation,  it  was  agreed  that  one  of  the  four 


48  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

employee  members  of  the  general  committee  on  adjust- 
ment, and  one  of  the  three  employee  members  of  the 
rules  committee  should  be  elected  from  the  "  Federal 
Street  Works,"  the  smaller  of  the  two  groups  of  fac- 
tories which  comprise  the  Lynn  plant,  the  other  mem- 
bers coming  from  the  larger  or  "  Eiver  Works." 

This  plan  of  representation  is  pictured  in  Chart  No. 
1  on  page  49.  The  chart  was  designed  to  show  the 
"  source  of  power "  or  representative  character,  of  the 
representatives  of  men  and  management  in  the  system. 
The  chart  does  not  show  what  becomes  of  a  case  in  the 
event  of  failure  of  the  general  committee  to  adjust  it. 
This  is  indicated  in  Chart  No.  2,  which  shows  how  a 
grievance  may  go  from  the  individual  employee  either 
directly  to  his  foreman  or  through  his  representatives 
to  his  foreman;  thence,  if  unsettled,  to  his  shop  com- 
mittee ;  thence,  if  unsettled,  to  the  manufacturing  head ; 
thence  to  the  general  committee;  and  thence  to  the 
manager  of  the  plant. 

The  Lynn  plan  was  the  outgrowth  of  an  award  of  the 
National  War  Labor  Board.  It  was  worked  out  in  joint 
conference  between  representatives  of  the  management, 
of  the  men  and  the  Board  and  up  to  the  time  this  book 
goes  to  press,  still  enjoys  the  unshaken  confidence  of 
the  parties  directly  involved.  Taken  in  connection  with 
the  foregoing  analysis,  the  following  summary  of  the 
plan  tells  the  whole  story : 

EEPRESENTATION  OF  EMPLOYEES 

GENERAL  ELECTRIC  COMPANY 

LYNN  WORKS 

A  committee  of  employees  of  the  Lynn  Works,  and  a  commit- 
tee of  the  management,  meeting  under  the  auspices  of  the 
Examiner  in  charge  of  the  award,  have  drawn  up  the  following 
plan  of  shop  committees. 

In  order  to  carry  out  the  plan,  the  Works  have  been  divided 
into  sections  each  containing,  as  nearly  as  practicable,  200 


CHART  ffo.  t 

PLAN  OF  REPRESENTATION  o 


tiens  VvyFma  75-365^  Sheft  composed  of  from  S'SJectioas  eoth+Tetvl 

ef  Sections  Si* Shops  20 


Employees 


Management 


Each 
Stetim 

ofAtproc 
mately 

200 
Employed 


CHART  No. 


o  ROUTE  OF  ATT  Issus  «• 


CHART  ILLUSTRATING  LYNN  PLAN.     (See  page  48.) 
49 


50  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

employees.  These  sections  have  been  grouped  into  "  shops " 
representing  manufacturing  groups  of  similar  or  allied  manu- 
factures. 

Except  for  certain  special  sections,  each  section  is  entitled 
to  two  employees'  representatives,  to  be  selected  by  secret 
ballot  from  the  employees  in  the  section. 

Not  less  than  30  days  before  the  second  general  election  and 
all  subsequent  general  elections,  the  Joint  Committee  on  Rou- 
tine, Procedure  and  Elections,  hereinafter  provided  for,  shall 
review  the  division  of  the  Works  into  sections  and  "  shops  " 
and  shall  make  any  changes  which  may  be  necessary  to  carry 
out  the  principles  laid  -down  in  the  plan. 


(1)  Elections   of    representatives    shall   be   held   semi-an- 
nually. 

(2)  One-half    the    number    of    representatives    shall    be 
elected  at  each  semi-annual  election. 

(3)  The  term  of  office  of  a  representative  shall  be  one 
year;  provided,  however,  that  in  the  case  of  the  rep- 
resentative  chosen   at  the  first  elections,   one   repre- 
sentative from  each  section  shall  be  retired  by  lot  at 
the  next  ensuing  election. 

(4)  Retiring   representatives,   and   representatives   whose 
terms  of  office  have  expired,  shall  be  eligible  for  re- 
election. 

(5)  Any  representative  may  be  recalled  on  written  request 
of  two-thirds  of  the  employees  qualified  to  vote  in  the 
section  in  which  he  has  been  elected. 

(6)  Any  representative  shall  be  deemed  to  have  vacated 
his  office  upon  ceasing  to  be  an  employee  of  the  Com- 
pany. 

(7)  Vacancies    in    the   office   of   representative   occurring 
from  any  cause  shall  be  filled,  for  the  unexpired  term, 
by  a  special  election  to  be  conducted  forthwith,  in 
the  section  where  the  vacancy  occurs,  and  in  a  man- 
ner similar  to  that  of  the  general  elections. 

(8)  In  case  any  representative  is   incapacitated,  a  tem- 
porary  representative,    to    replace    him   during    such 
incapacity  only,  may  be  elected  on  the  written  request 
of  two-thirds  of  the  employees  qualified  to  vote  in  the 
section  in  which  the  incapacitated  representative  was 
elected.     In  such  case  a  special  election  shall  be  con- 
ducted in  the  section  in  a  manner  similar  to  that  of 
the  general  election. 


THE  LYNN  PLAN  51 

Employees  must  possess  all  the  qualifications  herein  enu- 
merated in  order  to  be  eligible  to  hold  office  as  representatives 
or  committeemen : 

(1)  Employees  who  have  been   in  the  Lynn  Works  for 
one  year. 

(2)  Employees  who  are  American  citizens,  or  who  have 
taken  out  their  first  papers. 

(3)  Employees  who  are  able  to  read  and  write  the  Eng- 
lish language. 

(4)  Employees  of  Apprentice  Departments,  eighteen  years 
of  age  or  over,  who  fulfill  the  above  qualifications. 

(5)  Employees  of  other  departments  twenty-one  years  of 
age  or  over. 

(6)  No  foreman  or  leading  hand. 

(7)  No  alien  enemy. 

The  following  classes  are  eligible  to  vote: 

(1)  Every  employee  in  the  Lynn  Works,  except  foremen 
and    leading    hands,    regardless    of    age    or    term    of 
service. 

(2)  After  the  first  election  only  employees  who  have  been 
in  the  Lynn  Works  for  a  period  of  three  months  prior 
to  the  election  shall  be  entitled  to  vote. 

METHOD   OF  CONDUCTING   ELECTIONS 

The  first  election  shall  be  conducted  according  to  a  method 
prescribed  by  the  National  War  Labor  Board. 

Succeeding  elections  shall  be  conducted  according  to  a 
method  to  be  determined  by  the  Joint  Committee  on  Routine, 
Procedure  and  Elections.  This  committee  shall  undertake  the 
determination  of  these  questions  at  least  sixty  days  before  each 
general  election. 

ORGANIZATION   OF  COMMITTEES 

Immediately  after  the  result  of  a  general  election  has  been 
announced  all  the  representatives  elected  at  the  River  Works 
shall  meet,  select  a  presiding  officer  and  a  secretary  and  pro- 
ceed to  elect  three  employees  to  serve  as  members  of  the  Gen- 
eral Joint  Committee  on  Adjustment.  In  a  similar  manner  all 
the  representatives  elected  from  the  Federal  Street  (West 
Lynn)  Works  shall  meet  and  elect  one  member  of  this  com- 
mittee. 

Members  of  the  General  Committee  may  be  selected  from  the 


52  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

employees  at  large,  or  from  duly  elected  representatives  of 
sections.  If  an  elected  representative  be  chosen  to  serve  on  the 
General  Committee,  his  office  as  representative  shall  be  de- 
clared vacant  and  a  new  election  shall  be  held  to  choose  his 
successor. 

The  representatives  of  the  River  Works  shall  elect  from 
their  number,  at  the  same  time,  two  members  of  the  Joint 
Committee  on  Routine,  Procedure  and  Elections;  and  the  rep- 
resentatives at  Federal  Street  (West  Lynn)  shall  elect  one 
member  of  this  committee. 

As  soon  as  possible  after  the  announcement  of  these  elec- 
tions the  representatives  elected  for  each  "  Shop  "  shall  meet 
and  elect  from  among  their  number  three  members  of  the  Joint 
Shop  Committee  for  that  Shop. 

Representatives  may  serve  on  one  Joint  Committee  only. 

The  result  of  the  first  election  will  be  recorded  by  the  Ex- 
aminer in  charge  of  the  administration  of  the  award  of  the 
War  Labor  Board.  The  result  of  subsequent  elections  shall 
be  reported  to  the  Management  in  writing,  signed  in  case  of 
members  of  the  General  Committee  by  the  presiding  officer  and 
secretary,  and  in  case  of  members  of  the  Joint  Shop  Commit- 
tee, by  all  the  representatives  taking  part  in  the  Election. 

The  management  shall  appoint  to  each  Joint  Committee  as 
many  members  as  there  are  employees'  representatives,  but 
no  more. 

JOINT  COMMITTEES 

The  following  Joint  Committees  are  constituted  under  this 
plan: 

1.  Joint  Committee  on  Routine,  Procedure  and  Elections. 

2.  General  Joint  Committee  on  Adjustment. 

3.  Joint  Shop  Committees. 

JOINT   COMMITTEE   ON   ROUTINE,   PBOCEDUEE   AND   ELECTIONS 

The  Joint  Committee  on  Routine,  Procedure  and  Elections 
shall  have  charge  of  all  matters  relating  to  dates  and  hours 
of  meetings  of  all  Joint  Committees,  the  regulation  of  their 
methods  of  procedure,  but  not  of  the  action  taken  by  them,  of 
the  routine  of  procedure  in  matters  requiring  adjustment,  and 
of  all  matters  relating  to  elections,  including  all  controversies 
concerning  the  fairness  of  an  election. 

PROCEDURE  IN   MATTERS   REQUIRING   ADJUSTMENT 
1.  Committee  on  Fair  Dealing: 

The  employees'  representatives  of  each  section  shall 
constitute'  a  Committee  on  Fair  Dealing  to  cooperate 


THE  LYNN  PLAN  53 

with  the  Management  in  fostering  just  and  harmonious 
relations  between  the  Management  and  employees. 

2.  Reference  to  Foreman: 

Any  matter  requiring  adjustment,  may  in  the  first 
instance,  be  referred  by  the  employee  affected  either  per- 
sonally or  with  one  or  both  of  the  representatives  of 
his  section,  to  the  foreman  of  the  work  on  which  the 
employee  is  engaged. 

3.  Reference  to  the  Joint  Shop  Committee: 

If  the  foreman  fails  to  adjust  satisfactorily  any  mat- 
ter referred  to  him,  it  shall  then  be  reduced  to  writing 
and  taken  up  by  the  Joint  Shop  Committee.  This  Com- 
mittee shall  endeavor  finally  to  dispose  of  the  matter 
and  shall  be  at  liberty  to  adopt  such  means  as  are 
necessary,  including  the  calling  of  witnesses  by  either 
side,  adequately  to  ascertain  the  facts  and  render  a 
fair  decision.  Should  the  Committee  reach  a  decision 
satisfactory  to  the  employee  originating  the  matter,  or1 
should  the  Committee  reach  a  unanimous  decision  on 
the  subject,  this  decision  shall  be  regarded  as  terminat- 
ing the  matter. 

4.  Reference  to   the  Manufacturing  Engineer  or  Depart- 

ment Head: 

Should  the  Committee  fail  satisfactorily  to  adjust 
a  matter  referred  to  it,  a  written  report  shall  be  made, 
together  with  the  recommendations  of  the  Committee, 
if  any,  and  this  report  shall  be  submitted  to  the  depart- 
ment head  or  manufacturing  engineer  for  his  action. 

5.  References  to  the  General  Joint  Committee  on  Adjust- 

ment: 

Should  the  Manufacturing  Engineer  fail  to  adjust 
satisfactorily  any  matter  referred  to  him,  the  question 
may  then  be  referred  to  the  General  Joint  Committee 
on  Adjustment  for  action  and  report  thereon  to  the 
Management.  Should  the  Committee  reach  a  decision 
on  any  matter  referred  to  it  which  is  satisfactory  to 
the  employee  or  employees  originating  the  matter,  or 
should  the  decision  of  the  Committee  on  the  question 
be  unanimous,  this  decision  shall  terminate  the  mat- 
ter. In  case  the  Committee  fails  to  reach  a  decision 
under  the  preceding  provisions,  it  shall  be  referred  to 
the  Manager. 


54  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 


RECORDS   OF  COMMITTEE  MEETINGS 

Every  Joint  Committee  shall  keep  accurate  records  of  its 
proceedings. 

MANAGER'S  REPRESENTATIVE 

The  Manager  may  appoint  an  industrial  representative  to 
facilitate  close  relationship  between  the  Management  and  the 
representatives,  and  at  any  stage  in  the  program  of  proceed- 
ings the  Manager's  representative  may  be  called  in  to  exercise 
his  good  offices.  He  may  attend  any  meeting  but  shall  have 
no  vote. 

DISCRIMINATION 

There  shall  be  no  discrimination  either  on  the  part  of  the 
employees  or  the  Management  in  respect  to  race,  creed,  society, 
fraternity  or  union. 

ACCOMMODATION 

The  Management  shall  provide  a  suitable  place  for  meetings 
and  defray  such  expenses  as  are  necessarily  incidental  to  the 
activities  herein  provided  for. 

AMENDMENTS 

Any  course  of  procedure  herein  provided  for  may  be  amended 
by  unanimous  vote  of  the  Joint  Committee  on  Routine,  Pro- 
cedure and  Elections. 

Under  the  award  of  the  War  Labor  Board,  the  Lynn 
shop  committees  were  ordered  to  review  the  wage  scale 
from  top  to  bottom  and  make  it  comparable  with  the 
wage  scale  of  the  Schenectady  Works  of  the  General 
Electric  Company.  The  performance  of  this  task  was 
a  severe  test  of  the  new  system,  but  the  test  was  met 
successfully.  For  this  reason,  and  because,  further,  the 
Lynn  plan  appears  to  be  based  on  fundamentally  sound 
principles,  it  is  commended  to  the  study  of  all  who  are 
interested  in  the  shop  committee  movement. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THREE   CHARACTERISTIC   PLANS 

THE  Lynn  plan,  described  in  the  last  chapter,  shows 
how  a  shop  committee  system  can  be  built  into  and 
fitted  to  the  particular  and  special  needs  of  a  very  large 
and  complex  industry.  The  apparent  elaborateness  of 
the  Lynn  plan  was  necessary  because  of  the  elaborate- 
ness of  the  manufacture  in  the  Lynn  plant.  But  the 
shop  committee  idea  is  nevertheless  equally  adaptable  to 
smaller  and  simpler  industries,  as  well  as  to  even  larger 
and  more  involved  industrial  situations. 

The  shop  committee  system  established  at  the  Pitts- 
field  Machine  and  Tool  Company,  Pittsfield,  Mass.,  has 
already  been  mentioned.  It  is  worth  further  attention 
at  this  point  because  it  is  an  illustration  of  the  adapta- 
tion of  the  shop  committee  to  a  small  factory. 

In  the  fall  of  1918  this  factory  employed,  in  round 
numbers,  one  hundred  men  and  women.  The  men,  who 
were  in  the  majority,  were  skilled  machinists,  tool- 
makers,  "  specialists "  on  machine  work,  laborers  and 
apprentices.  The  girls  were  doing  semi-skilled  work, 
chiefly  the  winding  of  wire.  The  plant  was  comprised 
in  a  single  building. 

For  some  weeks  prior  to  the  installation  of  the  shop 
committee  system,  the  men  had  been  joining  the  union. 
Inasmuch  as  this  was  during  the  war,  they  realized 
that  they  could  not  force  recognition  of  the  union  and 
a  reversal  of  the  company's  policy  of  maintaining  an 
open  shop.  The  company,  on  the  other  hand,  made 
no  objection  to  the  union  activities  of  the  men,  and 

55 


56  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

was  always  ready  to  meet  with  them,  either  individually 
or  collectively.  Both  sides  favored  the  shop  committee 
as  a  happy  solution  of  their  common  difficulties. 

At  a  joint  conference  held  in  the  manager's  office 
a  plan  for  a  shop  committee  system  was  drawn  up  and 
agreed  to.  In  view  of  the  small  size  of  the  plant  it 
was  decided  that  a  single  committee  could  adequately 
represent  the  entire  works.  The  women  were  offered 
representation  on  the  committee,  but  declined.  Elec- 
tion rules  and  procedure  were  drafted  on  the  basis  of 
similar  rules  and  procedure  in  other  plants  (see  Chapter 
VII).  The  election  was  held  toward  the  end  of  the 
working  day  later  in  the  week  of  the  conference. 

A  Simple  Problem 

So  small  was  this  plant  that  the  vexatious  problem 
of  the  basis  of  representation  practically  settled  itself. 
The  workers  naturally  desired  to  choose  committeemen 
who  were  acquainted  with  the  different  operations  in  the 
shop,  and  no  formal  districting  was  necessary.  Nor  was 
it  necessary  to  establish  more  than  one  committee,  the 
small  size  making  it  possible  for  a  single  committee 
to  serve  both  as  a  mediating  and  as  a  judicial  body. 
The  principal  value  of  the  installation  of  this  system 
was,  first,  that  it  organized  a  local  industrial  government 
for  the  plant  in  which  every  employee,  regardless  of 
outside  affiliation,  had  equal  voice.  Second,  it  guaran- 
teed to  the  management  that  when  the  duly  elected 
committee  requested  a  conference,  the  matter  to  be  con- 
sidered was  one  of  interest  to  the  entire  body  of  em- 
ployees. Third,  it  brought  about  a  permanent  means 
of  maintaining  between  men  and  management  the  good 
relations  of  the  past  which  rapidly  changing  conditions 
in  the  industrial  world  at  times  threatened  to  disrupt. 

In  sharp  contrast  to  this  one-committee  shop  com- 
mittee system  is  the  so-called  cooperative  plan  of  the 


THREE  CHARACTERISTIC  PLANS        57 

Philadelphia  Rapid  Transit  Company.  This  plan  is 
interesting  because  it  shows  that  the  shop  committee 
form  of  government  can  be  successfully  applied  to  the 
transportation  industry.  It  is  also  interesting  because 
it  shows  how  a  shop  committee  system  can  be  grafted, 
so  to  speak,  onto  a  Welfare  Association,  thus  bringing 
it  up  to  date  and  rendering  it  capable  of  meeting  modern 
demands. 

The  Philadelphia  Plan 

The  Philadelphia  plan  was  developed  in  1918  as  a 
result  of  a  joint  conference  between  men  and  manage- 
ment. The  first  elections  were  supervised  by  the  Na- 
tional War  Labor  Board.  The  history  1  of  this  plan, 
while  of  great  significance,  need  not  be  recounted  here 
beyond  saying  that  the  basis  of  it  was  a  Cooperative 
Welfare  Association  established  in  1911  at  a  time  when 
the  company  faced  a  serious  financial  crisis.  The  pur- 
pose of  the  Cooperative  Welfare  Association  was  similar 
to  that  of  a  shop  committee  system,  namely,  to  create 
and  maintain  mutually  satisfactory  relations  on  the 
theory  that  such  relations  both  served  the  public  and 
secured  the  investments  of  stockholders. 

When  the  shop  committee  system  was  established,  the 
Philadelphia  Rapid  Transit  Company  employed  nearly 
10,000  workers.  Through  the  welfare  organization  men 
and  management  had  come  into  close  contact,  wages  had 
been  adjusted,  sick  and  death  benefits  had  been  assured, 
and  working  conditions  had  been  improved.  The  wel- 
fare association  alone  failed  to  provide  an  organization 
sufficiently  complete  and  effective  for  all  the  needs  of 
genuine  collective  bargaining.  The  new  plan  broadened 
and  enlarged  certain  features  of  the  old  plan,  and  pro- 

i  See  pamphlet  entitled  "  A  Plan  for  Collective  Bargaining 
and  Cooperative  Welfare,"  published  in  1918  by  the  Philadel- 
phia Rapid  Transit  Co. 


58  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

vided  a  system  of  adjustment  entirely  separate  and  dis- 
tinct from  the  cooperative  welfare  work.  This  separa- 
tion is  well  worth  noting. 

Districting  the  Railroad  Organization 

The  first  task  was  the  districting  of  the  industry. 
Study  of  this  problem  soon  developed  the  fact  that  the 
unit  of  representation  was  already  in  existence,  namely, 
the  depots,  the  stations  and  the  divisions  of  the  road. 
The  industry  was  already  further  grouped  into  five 
departments,  each  of  which  included  a  number  of  units : 
the  transportation  department,  the  rolling  stock  and 
buildings  department,  the  electrical  department,  the  way 
department,  and  the  general  office  department.  No  new 
or  artificial  sectioning  was  here  necessary,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  Lynn  plan.  While  the  number  of  employees 
in  the  different  depots,  stations  and  divisions  varied 
within  considerable  limits,  the  fact  that  a  given  unit 
contained,  broadly  speaking,  similar  crafts  or  occupa- 
tions and  was  also  bounded  by  well  defined  geographical 
lines,  fulfilled  the  general  principles  of  representation 
discussed  in  Chapter  IV. 

Each  depot,  station  or  division  under  the  plan  was 
allowed  two  representatives,  or  "branch  committee- 
men,"  who  were  elected  by  the  workers  in  the  customary 
fashion. 

Each  department  was  given  a  committee,  composed 
of  all  the  branch  committeemen  or  representatives 
elected  in  that  particular  department. 

Each  department  committee  elected  two  of  its  mem- 
bers to  serve  on  the  general  committee. 

The  management  appointed  an  equal  number  of 
representatives  to  meet  jointly  with  the  branch,  depart- 
ment and  general  committees. 

The  skeleton  or  framework  of  the  Philadelphia  sys- 
tem is  quite  similar  to  that  of  the  Lynn  system.  The 


CHART  OF  ORGANIZATION 


THE  COMPANY 


EDUCATION 


ARBITRATION 
THROUGH  THE  PUBLIC 

CHAIRMAN 

PU8LJC  SERVICE  COMMISSION 
REPRESENTING 

SERVICE 


PRESIDENT 
CHAMBER  OF  COMMCRCI 

REPRESENTING 

COMMERCE 


CHABT  ILLUSTRATING  PHILADELPHIA  PLAN.     (See  page  60.) 


59 


60  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

branch  committeemen  correspond  to  the  representatives 
in  the  Lynn  system;  the  department  committees  corre- 
spond to  the  shop  committees;  and  the  general  commit- 
tees in  both  systems,  though  elected  somewhat  differ- 
ently, are  essentially  alike  in  purpose,  make-up  and 
function. 

Arbitration  Provision 

The  Philadelphia  plan  further  contained  a  provision 
for  arbitration  which  in  one  form  or  another  should  be 
an  essential  part  of  every  shop  committee  system.  The 
scheme  as  set  forth  appears  to  be  both  ingenious  and 
practicable : 

"  If  resort  to  arbitration  becomes  necessary,  then  there  shall 
be  an  arbitrator  chosen  by  the  general  committee  for  em- 
ployees and  an  arbitrator  chosen  by  the  general  committee  for 
employer;  the  two  arbitrators  so  chosen  to  select  a  third  arbi- 
trator. Failing  unanimous  decision,  the  decision  of  any  two 
of  these  arbitrators  shall  be  binding. 

"  In  the  event  that  the  arbitrators  chosen  by  the  general 
committee  for  employees  and  the  arbitrator  chosen  by  the  gen- 
eral committee  for  employer  are  unable  to  agree  upon  a  third 
arbitrator,  then  the  provost  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania, 
the  chairman  of  the  Public  Service  Commission,  and  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  shall  be  requested  to  serve 
as  additional  arbitrators,  or,  failing  so  to  do,  to  appoint  their 
own  personal  representatives  to  act  as  such  additional  arbi- 
trators. Failing  unanimous  decision,  the  decision  of  any  three 
of  these  five  arbitrators  shall  be  binding." 

The  chart  on  page  59  indicates  the  reason  for  the  se- 
lection of  the  additional  arbitrators,  and  also  puts  in 
graphic  form  the  scheme  of  representation. 

The  Bridgeport  Plan 

Far  more  difficult  of  organization  than  either  the 
Lynn,  Pittsfield  or  the  Philadelpbia  systems  was  that 
which  was  worked  out  for  the  Bridgeport,  Connecticut, 
munitions  plants  in  the  summer  and  fall  of  1918. 


THREE  CHARACTERISTIC  PLANS        61 

Sixty-two  separate  plants  were  involved,  and  the  em- 
ployees affected  numbered  between  fifty  and  sixty  thou- 
sand. The  production  of  these  factories  was  almost 
entirely  for  the  war  purposes  of  the  United  States  Gov- 
ernment. It  is  not  necessary  to  recount  here  the  history 
of  the  stormy  events  which  menaced  not  only  the  local 
peace  of  Bridgeport  itself,  but  imperiled  the  success  of 
the  allied  armies,  which  depended  to  a  large  extent  on 
Bridgeport  for  the  manufacture  of  ammunition  for  rifles 
and  machine  guns.  Had  the  Union  Metallic  Cartridge 
Company  alone  closed  down  at  this  time  it  is  well  within 
the  truth  to  say  that  the  United  States  could  not  have 
proceeded  with  the  final  push  which  ended  the  war  in 
November. 

The  problem  of  securing  agreements  between  the  em- 
ployers and  employees  involved  in  the  Bridgeport  sit- 
uation was,  therefore,  complicated  by  many  grave  consid- 
erations. For  the  very  reasons  above  indicated  the 
speedy  establishment  of  a  workable  shop  committee  sys- 
tem was  a  prime  national  necessity. 

The  Bridgeport  plan  is  essentially  very  simple.  Its 
main  features  are: 

1.  Employees'  department  committees  of  three,  "  one 
committee  for  each  group  of  workers  under  a  foreman 
or  f  orelady." 

2.  Employees'  general  committee  for  each  plant,  com- 
posed either  of  the  chairmen  of  the  department  com- 
mittees, or  an  executive  committee  elected  by  these  chair- 
men. 

3.  Representatives  of  the  management  appointed  to 
deal  with  the  employee  committees. 

4.  A  local  joint  board  of  mediation  and  conciliation, 
composed   of   three   representatives   of   employees   and 
three  of  manufacturers. 


62  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

Committee  Functions 

Under  this  plan  the  problem  of  districting  is  solved 
almost  automatically.  By  considering  each  group  un- 
der a  foreman  as  the  unit  of  government,  complete 
craft  or  occupational  representation  is  assured,  and  geo- 
graphical representation  takes  care  of  itself.  The  com- 
mittees of  three  elected  to  represent  the  various  groups 
or  shops  have  two  functions:  first,  the  function  of  at- 
tempting to  secure  adjustments  with  the  foremen;  and, 
second,  the  function  of  meeting  with  the  management 
on  cases  in  which  settlement  with  the  foreman  has  failed. 
The  general  committee  for  each  plant  at  Bridgeport  sits 
in  joint  conference  with  the  management  to  review  all 
cases  and  matters  not  settled  between  the  department 
committees  and  the  management.  In  addition,  the 
general  committee  serves  as  a  rules  or  election  commit- 
tee. The  local  board  of  mediation  and  conciliation  has 
the  function  of  representing  the  entire  body  of  em- 
ployees and  manufacturers  in  the  Bridgeport  plants 
coming  under  the  scope  of  the  plan. 

The  method  of  procedure  under  this  simple  machin- 
ery of  adjustment  was  worked  out  in  great  detail  and 
has  been  proved  by  experience  to  be  entirely  practicable. 
The  power  and  functions  of  each  set  of  committees,  as 
well  as  the  method  of  procedure  was  made  the  subject 
of  a  signed  agreement x  which  has  every  appearance 
of  leaving  no  excuse  or  loophole  for  evading  the  princi- 
ples of  the  covenant  thus  created.  In  the  chapter  on 
Procedure  some  of  the  provisions  of  the  Bridgeport  shop 
committee  system  are  quite  fully  discussed,  but  it  is 
well  to  emphasize  here  also  the  value  of  having  regula- 
tions so  carefully  drawn  that  there  can  not  be  the  slight- 

i  "  Organization  and  By-Laws  for  Collective  Bargaining  Com- 
mittees, instituted  by  the  National  War  Labor  Board  for 
Bridgeport,  Conn." 


THREE  CHARACTERISTIC  PLANS        63 

est  misunderstanding  of  the  way  in  which  the  system  is 
intended  to  work. 

The  Bridgeport  plan  is  worth  more  extended  analysis 
than  can  be  given  it  in  these  necessarily  brief  pages. 
Remarkably  complete  in  structure,  it  is  nevertheless 
easy  of  operation  and  certainly  as  democratic  in  prin- 
ciples as  other  systems  established  during  the  same  pe- 
riod. 

Judging  by  the  evidence  afforded  by  the  Pittsfield, 
Philadelphia  and  Bridgeport  shop  committee  plans,  the 
shop  committee  theory  is  capable  of  adaptation  to  very 
small  plants,  to  peculiar  industries  like  transportation, 
and  to  groups  of  plants  in  which  similar  or  allied  man- 
ufacture is  being  carried  on.  Are  we  not  justified  in 
drawing  the  further  conclusion  that  the  shop  commit- 
tee is  a  device  in  industrial  government  which,  if  prop- 
erly shaped  to  the  special  or  local  end  in  view  is  of  uni- 
versal application? 


CHAPTER  VII 

ELECTION    MACHINERY 

ENOUGH  has  been  said  in  the  preceding  chapters  to  give 
a  fair  idea  of  the  general  principles  of  shop  committee 
government  as  well  as  of  the  practical  application  of 
these  principles.  We  now  come  logically  to  the  question 
of  the  election  machinery;  in  other  words,  to  a  discus- 
sion of  the  detailed  methods  of  supervising  and  hold- 
ing elections. 

It  should  go  without  saying  that  the  first  essential 
requirement  is  that  the  elections  should  be  absolutely 
fair  and  aboveboard.  Since  the  object  of  the  elections 
is  to  choose  representatives  of  the  employees,  it  follows 
that  the  elections  are,  above  all  else,  employees'  elec- 
tions. That  is  to  say,  none  but  employees  may  nominate, 
vote  and  address  the  meetings.  All  employees,  there- 
fore, must  be  on  equal  terms  at  the  elections :  the  ballot- 
ing should  be  secret,  there  should  be  no  "  lobbying  "  at 
or  near  the  polls,  and  the  customary  restrictions  to 
guard  against  fraud  and  cheating  must  be  enforced. 

But  while  the  management  is  not  directly  concerned 
in  the  elections,  it  has  the  right  to  demand  that  the 
elections  be  fair,  that  none  but  employees  participate, 
and  that  no  employee,  regardless  of  his  union  affilia- 
tion or  lack  of  union  affiliation,  be  discriminated  against. 
If  the  elections  are  "straight,"  the  management  is 
bound  to  recognize  and  deal  with  the  committees.  If 
there  is  any  question  about  the  character  of  the  elec- 
tions, the  management  is  correct  in  withholding  recog- 

64 


ELECTION  MACHINEKY  65 

nition  till  it  can  be  satisfied  that  all  was  as  it  should 
have  been. 

For  these  reasons  it  is  desirable  that  the  election 
rules  should  be  worked  out  in  joint  conference  by  em- 
ployer and  employee.  After  the  rules  have  been  worked 
out  and  proper  means  adopted  for  impartial  super- 
vision of  the  elections,  the  management  should  main- 
tain a  strict  policy  of  hands  off. 

Such  a  policy  and  such  impartial  supervision  was 
required  by  the  National  War  Labor  Board.  Wherever 
shop  committee  elections  were  held  under  an  award 
of  this  body,  the  administrative  examiner,  or  some 
one  selected  by  him,  was  charged  with  the  duty  of 
running  the  elections.  In  the  future  many  shop 
committee  systems  will  doubtless  be  installed  out- 
side of  any  governmental  jurisdiction  whatever,  and 
a  wise  plan  of  procedure  would  be  for  employer  and 
employee  to  agree  on  some  disinterested  outsider  to 
take  charge  of  the  elections.  In  this  way  all  danger 
from  alleged  influence  on  the  part  of  the  management 
or  of  the  unions  can  be  avoided. 

Where  To  Hold  Elections 

Where  should  shop  committee  elections  be  held?  In 
the  early  days  of  the  development  of  shop  commit- 
tee systems  this  question  caused  considerable  difficulty. 
Practically  all  employers  have  advocated  the  holding 
of  elections  within  the  plant  or  shop  itself  on  the  ground 
that  an  election  is  purely  a  plant  or  shop  matter. 
Practically  all  representatives  of  labor,  on  the  other 
hand,  have  advocated  the  holding  of  elections  outside 
the  plant  on  the  ground  that  the  committees  are  com- 
mittees of  the  employees  and  that  the  employees  should 
be  free  to  select  them  where  and  as  they  choose. 

As  was  brought  out  in  Chapter  II,  the  War  Labor 
Board  in  the  Pittsfield  General  Electric  award  decided 


66 

that  the  elections  should  be  held  on  the  neutral  soil 
of  a  public  building,  thus  giving  neither  side  a  real 
or  imaginary  advantage  of  place.  In  later  awards  the 
practice  was  to  hold  the  elections  within  the  plant, 
of  course  under  government  supervision,  with  the  quali- 
fication, however,  that  the  election  should  be  conducted 
"  where  the  largest  total  vote  of  the  men  can  be  secured, 
consistent  with  fairness  of  count  and  full  and  free  ex- 
pression of  choice,  either  in  the  shop  or  in  some  con- 
venient public  building." 

Looking  at  the  question  of  place  from  the  point  of 
view  thus  set  forth,  it  will  generally  be  agreed  that 
the  largest  total  vote  can  be  secured  in  the  plant  rather 
than  outside  the  plant.  This  is  borne  out  by  experi- 
ence. In  Pittsfield  again,  for  example,  the  elections 
were  held  outside  the  plant  and  necessarily  outside 
regular  working  hours.  Many  employees  naturally  de- 
sired to  get  home  as  soon  as  possible  after  the  whistle 
blew,  and  the  desire  not  to  come  out  in  the  evening  also 
kept  many  away  from  the  polls  when  the  schedule  called 
for  elections  at  6,  7,  8  or  9  o'clock.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
probably  less  than  75%  of  the  Pittsfield  employees 
voted  —  a  large  percentage  when  compared  with  the 
vote  cast  at  the  average  municipal  election,  but  not  as 
large  as  the  record  made  at  the  Lynn  and  Bridgeport 
elections  held  in  the  plant,  where  the  figure  ranged  from 
80  to  100%  of  those  eligible  to  vote.  Elections  held 
in  the  plant,  moreover,  can  be  run  of!  in  less  time  than 
outside;  the  workers  are  relatively  near  any  room  or 
building  chosen  for  the  purpose,  and  it  is  possible  to 
have  the  voting  done  during  the  working  day.  Under 
an  honest  supervising  officer  and  with  a  management 
acting  in  good  faith,  elections  can  be  held  in  the  shop 
"consistent  with  fairness  of  count  and  full  and  free 
expression  of  choice."  As  a  matter  of  efficiency,  then, 


67 

and  wholly  aside  from  the  question  of  the  right  of 
workers  to  do  their  own  choosing  of  their  own  repre- 
sentatives when  and  where  they  wish,  the  factory  seems 
to  be  the  best  place  in  which  to  conduct  the  voting. 

The  Labor  Side  of  It 

The  argument  of  those  labor  leaders  who  contend 
that  elections  should  be  held  outside  the  plant  has 
already  been  stated  in  part.  To  what  has  been  said 
this  further  argument  should  be  added:  that  the  em- 
ployees have  nothing  to  say  as  to  the  place  where  the 
management  chooses  its  representatives,  nor  as  to 
whether  outside  influences,  such  as  employers'  associa- 
tions, are  consulted  in  the  selection;  that,  in  other 
words,  each  side  should  be  allowed  to  use  its  own  judg- 
ment and  to  follow  its  own  desires  in  selecting  its  own 
committee  members. 

This  argument  loses  sight  of  the  fact  that  in  the 
majority  of  instances  the  management  of  a  plant  con- 
ducts its  own  business  within  the  four  walls  of  the  plant, 
but  in  spite  of  this  oversight,  there  is  much  sound  com- 
mon sense  in  this  point  of  view.  The  right  of  workers 
to  bargain  collectively  through  their  chosen  representa- 
tives has  been  upheld  by  the  United  States  Government, 
and  it  would  seem  that  this  right  carries  with  it  the 
right  of  selecting  the  locality  where  representatives  are 
to  be  chosen.  On  the  broad  grounds  of  principle,  there 
seems  to  be  every  reason  to  permit  employees  to  vote 
where  they  please,  provided  they  can  give  to  the  manage- 
ment satisfactory  guarantees  that  the  voting  was  open 
to  all  employees  and  was,  in  addition,  fair  and  unin- 
fluenced. As  a  general  matter  of  expediency,  however, 
experience  in  holding  elections  goes  to  show  that  the 
factory  itself  is  by  far  the  better  place.  Frank  dis- 
cussion of  these  points  on  the  part  of  employer  and 


68  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

employee  will  usually  bring  about  a  satisfactory  and 
unanimous  agreement. 

Elections  In  the  Plant 

Whereabouts  in  the  plant  should  elections  be  held? 

There  are  two  possible  answers  to  this  question.  One 
is  to  decree  that  the  elections  shall  be  held  in  some 
central  building  in  the  plant;  the  other  is  to  hold  them 
in  the  actual  shop  where  the  employees  eligible  to  vote 
at  any  particular  election  are  at  work.  In  the  first 
case  it  is  necessary  for  the  employees  to  leave  their 
benches  for  a  period  of  from  fifteen  minutes  to  three- 
quarters  of  an  hour.  In  the  second  case,  either  the 
work  may  be  stopped  and  the  election  held  in  some  open 
portion  of  the  shop,  or  the  ballot  box  may  be  carried 
around  to  the  employees.  Thus  there  are  three  different 
methods  of  conducting  the  elections,  each  one  of  which 
has  been  successfully  used. 

The  practice  of  carrying  the  ballot  box  around  to 
the  voters  is  the  most  economical  of  the  time  of  the 
voters.  The  election  officials  merely  go  to  the  man  at 
his  bench  or  machine,  hand  him  a  ballot,  read  or  show 
him  the  list  of  nominations,  if  any,  and  receive  his 
marked  ballot  in  the  sealed  box.  In  plants  where  this 
method  has  been  employed,  a  shop  or  section  of  100 
has  been  voted  in  approximately  half  an  hour  with  a 
loss  of  time  to  the  individual  employee  of  a  very  few 
minutes.  The  disadvantages  of  this  method  are,  first, 
that  it  requires  more  labor  on  the  part  of  the  super- 
visor; second,  that  it  fails  to  give  an  opportunity  for 
a  convention  or  meeting  at  which  nominations  may  be 
made  and  the  purpose  and  details  of  the  election  ex- 
plained; and  third,  that  the  noise  of  the  machinery  is 
likely  to  add  confusion  and  to  encourage  misunder- 
standing. 

Where,  on  the  other  hand,  the  election  is  held  in  an 


ELECTION  MACHINERY  69 

open  space  on  the  floor  of  the  shop,  the  disadvantages 
just  mentioned  are  done  away  with.  Such  an  election, 
however,  requires  a  general  cessation  of  work,  including 
the  stopping  of  machines,  and  occupies  ten  or  fifteen 
minutes  of  the  time  of  each  worker.  The  advantages 
are,  first,  that  it  requires  less  of  the  time  of  the  super- 
visor; second,  that  it  brings  the  employees  together 
as  a  shop  or  group  for  the  purpose  of  making  nomina- 
tions and  so  on ;  and  third,  that  with  quiet  in  the  room, 
the  chance  of  misunderstanding  and  error  is  reduced. 
These  same  advantages  apply  to  the  method  of  hold- 
ing elections  in  a  central  place  in  the  plant.  When 
such  a  place  is  chosen,  it  is  equipped  with  semi-per- 
manent entrances  and  exits  and  booths,  and  provided 
also  with  tables,  chairs,  and  a  blackboard.  Each  elec- 
tion is  preceded  by  a  short  convention  at  which  the 
supervising  officer  in  the  chair  calls  the  meeting  to  order, 
explains  its  purpose,  answers  questions,  receives  nomina- 
tions, etc.  This  method  has  the  additional  advantage 
that  one  set  of  election  officers  can  handle  the  check- 
ing of  voters,  the  counting  of  the  ballots,  and  the  writ- 
ing of  election  reports,  thus  insuring  uniformity  of 
practice  and  speed.  In  practice  it  has  been  found  that 
it  is  easily  possible  to  run  off  a  section  of  as  many  as 
300  within  half  an  hour  under  one  supervisor.  In  a 
certain  plant  employing  10,000  workers  where  this 
method  was  used,  the  elections  of  all  the  sectional,  shop 
and  general  committees  were  completed  in  five  and  one- 
half  days,  under  the  supervision  of  two  men.  In  a 
plant  of  approximately  the  same  size  where  the  ballot 
box  was  carried  around,  six  supervisors  were  required  to 
do  the  work  in  the  same  time. 

Election  Rules 

But  regardless  of  the  method  of  election,  and  regard- 
less also  of  the  place  where  the  election  is  held,  there 


70  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

are  certain  practices  which  should  be  common  to  every 
well  managed  shop  committee  election.  Foremost 
among  these  is  the  drafting  of  a  set  of  election  rules 
covering  such  questions  as  term  of  office,  eligibility 
both  for  nomination  and  for  voting,  method  of  mak- 
ing nominations,  method  of  deciding  who  is  elected, 
method  of  checking  the  voters,  and  important  items 
such  as  the  referendum  and  the  recall.  These  regula- 
tions should  be  drawn  up  by  the  joint  election  com- 
mittee, and  should  be  posted  throughout  the  plant  several 
days  before  the  election.  The  execution  of  these  regula- 
tions should  be  left  to  the  supervisor,  assisted  by  the 
employee  members  of  the  election  committee. 

A  typical  set  of  election  rules,  based  on  actual  experi- 
ence, is  as  follows: 

ELECTION  REGULATIONS 
Eligibility 

The  following  classes  of  employees  are  eligible  to  vote: 

1.  Every  employee  in  the Works,  except  foremen  and 

leading  hands,  regardless  of  age  or  term  of  service. 

2.  After  the  first  election  only  employees  who  have  been 

in  the  Works  for  a  period  of  three  months  prior 

to  the  election  shall  be  entitled  to  vote. 

In  order  to  hold  office  employees  must  meet  the  following 
qualifications: 

1.  Continuous  employment  in  the Works  for  one  year. 

2.  Must    be   American    citizen,    or    have    taken    out    first 
papers. 

3.  Must  be  able  to  read  and  write  the  English  language. 

4.  Must  be  21  years  of  age  or  over. 

5.  Must  not  be  foreman,  leading  hand,  or  employed  in  su- 
pervising capacity. 

Terms  of  Representation 

1.  Elections  shall  be  held  annually. 

2.  Any  committeeman  may  be  recalled  at  a  special  election 
requested  on  petition  of  20%  of  his  constituents,  two- 
thirds  voting  in  favor  of  recall  prevailing  at  such  spe- 
cial election. 


71 

3.  A  committeeman  ceasing  to  be  an  employee  of  the 

Works  shall  be  deemed  to  have  resigned  his  office. 

4.  Vacancies  in  the  office  of  any  committeeman  shall  be 
filled,  for  the  unexpired  term,  by  a  special  election  con- 
ducted by  the  Elections  Committee  in  such  manner  as 
it  shall  order. 

5.  In    case   any    committeeman    is    incapacitated,    a   tem- 
porary  committeeman   may   be   elected   on  petition  of 
two-thirds  of  the  employees  of  his  shop. 

Procedure  at  Elections 

1.  Upon  arriving  at  the  election  hall,  each  employee  will 
give  his  name  and  clock  number  to  the  checker  at  the 
gate,  and  will  then  be  furnished  with  a  ballot. 

2.  When  the  employees  in  each  shop  are  fully  assembled, 
the  supervisor  of  elections  will  call  the  meeting  to  order 
and  ask  for  nominations.     Each  shop  will  elect  three 
committeemen,  but  there  is  no  limit  to  the  number  who 
may  be  nominated. 

3.  The  names  of  the  nominees  will  be  written  on  a  black- 
board, and  the  employees  will  proceed  to  the  booths 
and  write  their  ballots. 

4.  Ballots  containing  more  names  than  the  shop  is  entitled 
to  elect  will  be  thrown  out.     Ballots  containing  only 
one  name  will  be  counted. 

5.  The  candidates  receiving  the  highest  number  of  votes 
will  be  declared  elected. 

These  regulations  are  not  intended  to  be  complete, 
but  rather  to  suggest  the  points  which  ought  to  be 
covered.  Differing  local  conditions  will  require  special 
treatment  and  variation  from  the  methods  here  outlined. 
In  some  plants  a  bi-annual  election  is  better  than  an 
annual  election.  Again,  in  some  shop  committee  sys- 
tems it  has  been  found  desirable  to  declare  the  candi- 
date receiving  the  highest  number  of  votes  in  any  shop 
election,  the  chairman  of  the  shop  committee. 

Ballots,  Booths,  etc. 

Ballots  for  the  voting  should  be  cards  or  slips  of 
paper  of  convenient  size  with  a  notice,  such  as,  "  Vote 
for  Three,"  "Vote  for  Two  Only,"  or  "Fold  Here," 


72 

printed  on  the  face.  The  ballot  boxes  should  be  large 
enough  to  hold  all  the  votes  cast  in  any  one  election; 
the  slot  should  be  in  the  top,  and  the  box  should  be 
sealed  by  and  left  in  the  custody  of  the  election  officers. 
After  counting  the  ballots,  provision  should  be  made 
to  preserve  the  ballots  for  a  stated  period  in  case  of  a 
demand  for  a  recount.  The  record  of  each  election 
should  be  made  in  duplicate  or  triplicate  on  a  blank 
prepared  for  the  purpose  and  should  show :  the  name  or 
number  of  the  shop  or  section,  the  date  and  hour  of 
the  election,  the  candidates  nominated  and  the  votes 
received  by  each,  the  number  of  voters  checked  in, 
and  the  total  number  of  votes  cast.  After  being  signed 
by  the  tellers  and  countersigned  by  the  supervisor  of 
elections,  one  copy  of  this  record  should  be  filed  with 
the  management,  another  with  the  employees'  com- 
mittee, and  a  third  with  the  joint  election  committee. 
The  booths  may  be  extemporized  from  packing  boxes, 
mounted  on  work  benches. 

A  word  should  now  be  said  about  the  important  mat- 
ter of  checking  the  voters.  Probably  the  most  conven- 
ient method  is  to  use  the  company  payroll,  rearranged 
if  necessary,  in  order  to  include  on  one  sheet  or  set 
of  sheets  the  names  of  the  employees  of  each  section 
or  shop  eligible  to  vote.  These  lists  should  be  pre- 
pared and  posted  a  few  days  in  advance  of  the  election 
so  as  to  permit  the  correction  of  errors.  As  each 
employee  comes  to  the  gate,  he  should  be  checked  in 
by  a  clerk  of  the  committee.  In  some  plants  a  clerk 
from  the  particular  shop  or  section  pay  office  stands 
outside  the  election  hall  to  identify  the  voters,  thus  giv- 
ing the  management  an  assurance  which  it  has  the 
right  to  demand.  Other  ways  of  insuring  purity  of 
elections  will  readily  present  themselves. 

The  creation  of  a  regular  or  standing  general  joint 
committee  on  rules  is  usually  advisable.  Such  a  com- 


ELECTION  MACHINERY  73 

mittee  should  keep  the  records  of  the  elections,  should 
make  and  revise  the  election  rules,  should  conduct  the 
elections,  including  bye-elections  to  fill  vacancies,  and 
may  in  addition  be  charged  with  the  duty  of  redistrict- 
ing  the  plant  from  time  to  time  as  the  working  of  the 
system  or  the  creation  of  new  or  the  abolition  of  old 
sections  requires. 


CHAPTEK  VIII 

PROCEDURE 

IF  we  can  call  the  joint  agreement  on  which  a  shop 
committee  system  is  based  the  constitution  of  the  indus- 
trial government  of  the  plant,  we  may  say  that  the 
rules  of  procedure  for  the  system  are  the  laws  which 
apply  the  principles  of  the  constitution.  Smooth  and 
orderly  working  of  a  shop  committee  system  can  not 
be  obtained  unless  such  laws  are  first  carefully  formu- 
lated and  then  rigidly  enforced. 

We  have  seen  in  previous  chapters  that  the  general 
method  of  procedure  in  a  shop  committee  system  is 
for  the  grievance  or  matter  at  issue  to  be  referred  by 
the  individual  employee  first  to  his  representative  or 
committeeman ;  that  such  representative  or  committee- 
man  next  takes  the  case  up  with  the  foreman,  and, 
failing  settlement,  with  the  joint  shop  committee;  that 
the  shop  committee,  if  unable  to  agree,  refers  it  on  up 
through  the  regular  system  till  it  reaches  the  manager 
or,  in  rare  instances,  outside  arbitration.  But  in  order 
to  guide  the  business  of  these  various  representatives 
and  committees  it  is  necessary  to  lay  down  in  some 
detail  and  with  full  consideration  by  both  sides  certain 
specific  rules  of  procedure.  These  rules  will  naturally 
vary  according  to  the  situation,  but  in  all  plants  we  find 
that  many  of  the  problems  are  the  same  and  that  the 
same  or  similar  rules  will  apply. 

Practical  experience  tends  to  show  that  a  complete 
set  of  rules  of  procedure  can  not  be  laid  down  in  ad- 
vance of  the  establishment  of  a  shop  committee  system. 
Nevertheless  a  beginning  must  be  made,  and  in  all 

74 


PROCEDUEE  75 

probability  the  best  plan  is  for  the  joint  committee  of 
men  and  management  having  charge  of  the  development 
of  the  system  to  agree  on  a  set  of  temporary  rules  of 
procedure  which  may  later  be  revised  and  perfected 
by  the  general  joint  committee  on  rules. 

It  is  essential  above  all  that  the  rules  of  procedure 
should  be  uniform  throughout  the  plant,  and  the  in- 
dividual shop  committees  should  not  insist  on  consider- 
ing themselves  as  independent  of  the  rest  of  the  sys- 
tem. In  order,  however,  to  avoid  the  possible  danger 
of  establishing  an  undemocratic  set  of  regulations  and 
of  denying  a  minority  its  rights,  provision  should  be 
made  for  a  popular  referendum  on  rules  and  procedure 
whenever  a  certain  percentage  of  the  rank  and  file  de- 
mand it.  Abuses  will  creep  into  the  best  systems  of 
government,  and  the  only  adequate  remedy  for  abuses 
is  frank  and  free  discussion  and  full  opportunity  for 
amendment.  But  the  routine  work  of  making  and  en- 
forcing rules  should  be  left  to  the  rules  committee  to 
which  should  be  given  jurisdiction  over  the  entire  fac- 
tory. 

Among  the  subjects  which  rules  of  procedure  should 
cover  are : 

Time  and  place  of  meetings. 

Records  of  meetings. 

Method  of  arriving  at  committee  decisions. 

Method  of  investigating  cases. 

Compensation  for  committee  service. 

A  typical  set  of  rules  for  joint  shop  committee  meet- 
ings is  the  following: 

PROCEDURE  OF  SHOP  COMMITTEES 

1.  All  meetings  shall  be  held  at  5  P.  M. 

2.  A  shop  committee  meeting  falling  on  a  holiday  shall  b« 
held  at  5  p.  M.  on  the  working  afternoon  next  following. 


76  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

3.  Shop  committee  meetings  shall  be  held  in  accordance  with 
the  schedule  prepared  by  the  rules  committee.     Special  meet- 
ings of  shop  committees  may  be  called  at  the  request  of  one 
member,   made  to   two   members   of   the   rules   committee,   an 
employee  member  and  a  management  member,  who  shall  decide 
on  the  request  as  speedily  as  possible.     Meetings  shall  be  called 
to  order,  minutes  of  preceding  meeting  read  and  approved  and, 
in  the  event  that  no  business  is  presented,  immediate  adjourn- 
ment is  in  order. 

4.  The  members  of  each  joint  shop  committee  shall  serve  as 
chairman   in   alphabetical   rotation.     The   chairman   may   par- 
ticipate in  the  discussion  and  may  vote  as  a  member  of  the 
committee. 

5.  Each  committee  shall  choose  a  permanent  secretary  from 
among  its  members.     The  secretary  shall  keep  the  records  as 
hereinafter  specified.     The  secretary  may  serve  as  chairman. 

6.  The  secretary  of  the  shop  committee  shall  keep  the  min- 
utes of  each  meeting,  including  a  record  of  the  disposition  of 
each  case.     Each  member  of  the  committee  is  entitled  to  a 
copy  of  these  papers  and  one  copy  shall  be  filed  permanently 
with  the  rules   committee.     These  files  shall  be  open  to  the 
inspection  of  any  employee. 

7.  Every  question  to  be  considered  and  voted  on  by  a  shop 
committee  shall  first  be  reduced  to  writing,  signed  by  the  par- 
ties to  the  issue  and  filed  with  the  secretary  of  the  shop  com- 
mittee. 

8.  The  secretary  of  a  shop  committee  about  to  hear  a  case 
shall  notify  all  witnesses  whom  either  side  desires  to  have 
called  on  said  case  to  attend  at  the  proper  time  and  place. 
The  names  of  the  witnesses  shall  be  filed  with  the  secretary  by 
the  parties  requesting  their  presence. 

9.  When  a  member  of  a  shop  committee  is  directly  involved 
in  a  point  at  issue,  he  shall  be  deprived  of  his  vote,  and  one 
of  the  opposite  side,  to  be  selected  by  that  side,  shall  also  be 
deprived  of  his  vote  for  the  occasion.     Committeemen  thus  de- 
prived of  their  votes  may  participate  in  the  discussion. 

10.  If  one  member  of  the  employees'   side  or  one  member 
from  the  management's  side  is  absent,  one  member  from  the 
other  side  shall  retire.     No  meetings  of  a  shop  committee  shall 
be  held  when  less  than  two-thirds  of  the  employee  members 
and  of  the  management  members,  respectively,  are  present. 

11.  A   unanimous   vote    of   the   committee    shall   settle   any 
question.     If  a  majority  vote,  however,  is  satisfactory  to  the 
employee  bringing  an  issue  to  the  committee,  it  shall  be  con- 
sidered as  terminating  the  matter;  the  party  objecting  should 


PROCEDURE  77 

be  recorded  and  shall  have  the  right  to  submit  a  minority 
report.  In  case  the  majority  vote  is  not  satisfactory  to  the 
employee  bringing  the  issue,  the  matter  shall  be  carried  to  the 
next  committee  under  the  plan. 

12.  Each  decision  or  record  of  a  committee  meeting  shall  be 
numbered  as  to  shop  and  also  as  to  case  or  docket  number. 
Every  case  shall  be  docketed  in  the  order  received. 

13.  Each  shop  committee  decision  shall  be  available  to  the 
employee  or  employees  bringing  an  issue.     Copies  of  decisions 
shall  be  filed  with  the  management  and  with  the  rules  com- 
mittee and  may,  upon  order  of  the  rules  committee,  be  pub- 
lished in  the  plant. 

14.  Where  it  has  taken  some  time  to  reach  a  decision,  such 
decision  may  be  made  retroactive. 

15.  Employee  members  of  the  shop  committees  will  be  paid 
their  average  earnings  for  time  spent  at  regular  and  special 
meetings,  but  in  no  case  will  overtime  be  paid. 

These  rules  of  procedure  are  practically  self-explana- 
tory. Success  in  the  operation  of  a  shop  committee 
system  can  not  be  obtained  without  regularity  of  meet- 
ings, without  the  fullest  and  freest  opportunity  for 
securing  all  the  facts  necessary  to  a  decision,  and  with- 
out the  maintenance  of  careful  records.  In  some  plants 
the  shop  committees  do  not  meet  at  regular  intervals, 
but  are  called  only  when  there  is  business  for  them  to 
transact.  In  such  cases  it  should  be  clearly  agreed  that 
meetings  may  be  held  whenever  there  is  demand  from 
any  member,  acting  usually  on  the  request  of  a  constit- 
uent. 

The  rules  of  procedure  adopted  for  the  Bridgeport 
shop  committee  system  illustrate  this  method  of  doing 
business  and  also  suggest  several  interesting  variations 
from  the  typical  set  of  rules  just  given : 

METHOD  OF  PROCEDURE 

(30)  Employees  desiring  to  have  their  Department  Commit- 
tee act  for  them,  individually  or  collectively,  whether  as  an 
appeal  from  a  decision  of  their  foreman,  or  as  a  direct  presen- 
tation, shall  file  their  case  with  the  Chairman  of  said  Com- 
mittee in  writing  and  signed,  if  practicable;  otherwise,  the 


78  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

Chairman  of  the  Committee  shall  reduce  same  to  writing. 
These  matters  shall  be  transacted  on  the  premises  outside  of 
working  hours. 

(31)  The  Chairman  of  Department  Committees  shall  accept 
for  consideration  all  cases  filed  as  provided  under  Section  30. 

(32)  The   Chairman   of   any   Department   Committee   shall 
call  a  meeting  of  the  Committee  at  such  times  and  places  as 
the  circumstances  demand,  for  the  consideration  of  such  cases 
as  have  been  filed,  and  also  of  such  matters  as  the  Committee 
contemplates  initiating.     Such  meeting  shall  be  held  on  the 
premises  but  not  during  working  hours,  or  on  Company  time, 
except  upon  consent  of  the  Management. 

(33)  Whether  cases,  or  matters,   considered  in  accordance 
with  the  provisions  of  Section  32  shall  be  taken  up  with  the 
Management,   shall  be  decided  by  a  vote  of  the   Committee. 
Two  votes  for,  or  against,  any  proposition  shall  decide  and  no 
reference  or  appeal  to  the  joint  Department,   Executive,  or 
General  Committee  can  thereafter  be  made. 

(34)  Whenever  it  is  desirable  for  a  Department  Committee 
to  meet  with  the  Management  for  the  presentation  and  con- 
sideration of  prepared  cases  or  other  matters,  the  Chairman 
of  said  Committee  shall  request  through  the  Foreman  of  the 
Department   involved,   a   Joint   Conference   with   such    Repre- 
sentative or  Representatives  as  the  Management  shall  desig- 
nate for  this  purpose,  not  to  exceed  in  number  the  member- 
ship of  said  Department  Committee.     Such   request  shall  be 
accompanied  by  a  specification  in  writing  of  the  matters  to  be 
considered. 

(35)  The  Management   shall   meet  with   such   Department 
Committee  in  a  Joint  Conference  upon  the  date  requested,  or, 
if  for  any  reason  this  is  impracticable,  upon  one  of  the  next 
six  days  thereafter  mutually  agreed  upon,  not  counting  Sun- 
days and  Holidays. 

(36)  Any  Management  shall  have  the  privilege  of  calling  a 
Department  Committee  to  a  Joint  Conference  by  the  method 
set  forth  in  Sections  34  and  35. 

( 37 )  The  Chairmanship  of  each  Joint  Conference  shall  alter- 
nate between  the  Chairman  of  the  Department  Committee  and 
the  Spokesman  for  the  Management's  Representatives. 

(38)  All  Joint  Conferences  shall  be  held  immediately  fol- 
lowing the  close  of  the  day's  work  upon  the  date  fixed,  unless 
by  unanimous  vote  some  other  date  is  fixed,  either  in  the  De- 
partment involved,  or  in  some  suitable  room  convenient  thereto 
provided  by  the  Management  for  this  purpose.    Joint  Confer- 


PROCEDUEE  79 

ences  may  be  held  on  Company  time  by  consent  of  the  Man- 
agement. 

(39)  Joint  Conferences  shall  be  private  except  where  wit- 
nesses  may   be   called.     Full   and    free   opportunity    shall   be 
granted  to  all  present  to  discuss,  from  every  angle  and  view- 
point, all  cases  and  matters  presented  by  either  side  at  each 
Joint  Conference. 

(40)  Immediately   following  discussion   of  any   issue  at  a 
Joint  Conference,  a  vote  shall  be  taken  upon  the  question  at 
issue  and  a  majority  of  two  votes  of  the  entire  membership  of 
the  joint  committee  shall  decide;  that  is  five  votes  out  of  a 
joint  committee  of  six  shall  control. 

(41)  When  an  agreement  has  been  reached  the  case  or  mat- 
ter in  issue  is  settled  beyond  appeal,  and  shall  be  promptly  ad- 
justed in  accordance  therewith. 

(42)  When  no  agreement  has  been  reached,  the  Chairman  of 
the  Joint  Conference,  unless  such  case  be  withdrawn  by  the 
party  proposing  the  action,  shall  immediately  refer  in  written 
form  the  case  or  matter  in  issue  to  the  Chairman  of  the  Em- 
ployees' General  Committee  for  presentation,  discussion,  con- 
sideration and  disposition  at  a  Joint  Conference  between  said 
Employees'  General  Committee  and  a  like  or  less  number  of 
the  Management's  Representatives. 

(43)  A  record  of  proceedings  of  all  Joint  Conferences  shall 
be  made,  signed  by  all  members  present. 

The  business  of  the  general  joint  committees  should 
be  governed  by  the  same  rules  adopted  for  the  shop 
committees,  or  by  similar  rules. 

A  word  or  two  should  be  said  on  the  matter  of  com- 
pensation for  committee  work.  The  general  practice 
seems  to  be  for  the  management  to  pay  representatives 
or  employees  for  regular  committee  work.  In  some 
plants  all.  representatives  are  paid  in  accordance  with 
paragraph  '1'5  of  the  typical  rules.  In  other  plants  the 
company  pays  only  those  representatives  who  sit  on 
joint  committees,  and  for  the  time  spent  in  joint  com- 
mittee sessions;  time  spent  by  employee  representatives 
or  committeemen  in  adjusting  cases,  gathering  evidence 
and  performing  other  functions  of  their  office  is  not  paid 


80  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

for.  In  a  few  plants,  the  company  does  not  compensate 
the  employees'  representatives  for  any  time  outside  of 
their  regular  work  at  the  bench. 

It  is  difficult  to  make  a  hard  and  fast  rule  to  apply 
to  all  cases,  but  certain  general  principles  may  be 
stated  as  a  guide.  In  plants  where  the  management 
does  not  pay  employees'  representatives  the  position 
taken  —  often  by  employees  as  well  as  by  management 
—  is  that  these  representatives  are  officially  representing 
the  rank  and  file,  and  that  if  they  should  be  paid  for 
their  services,  the  rank  and  file  should  pay  them.  This 
usually  means  that  the  unions  will  furnish  the  compen- 
sation, though  in  some  establishments  the  funds  of  the 
mutual  benefit  association  are  drawn  upon,  or  a  special 
fund  created.  In  the  majority  of  plants  where  all  repre- 
sentatives are  paid  for  their  time,  the  position  taken  is 
that,  while  they  are  primarily  representing  the  rank 
and  file,  they  are  also  representing  the  best  interests 
of  the  company;  that,  in  short,  they  are  doing  work 
for  the  company  just  as  if  they  remained  at  their 
benches.  Where  representatives  are  paid  only  for  time 
spent  in  actual  committee  meetings,  the  position  is  that 
they  are  then  serving  in  a  judicial  capacity  for  this 
benefit  of  the  entire  plant,  and  should  accordingly  be 
compensated. 

Experience  shows  that  some  method  of  compensation 
is  both  desirable  and  necessary.  The  business  of  ad- 
justing disputes  between  men  and  management  calls 
for  both  time  and  energy.  It  calls  for  time  in  working 
hours  as  well  as  time  outside  working  hours.  Time 
to  the  piece  worker  especially  means  money,  and  loss 
of  time  means  loss  of  earnings.  In  practice  it  has 
been  found  that  unless  some  method  of  paying  for  shop 
committee  service  is  adopted,  the  service  rendered  is 
not  up  to  standard.  The  various  methods  in  use  should 
be  discussed  fully  in  joint  conference  of  men  and  man- 


PEOCEDURE  81 

agement  and  a  clear  understanding  should  be  arrived 
at  before  the  committees  are  elected. 

Underlying  the  rules  of  procedure  for  shop  committees 
should  be,  above  all,  the  spirit  of  cooperation  and  of 
fair  play.  If  this  spirit  is  permitted  to  have  full  scope, 
the  details  will  automatically  adjust  themselves. 


CHAPTER  IX 

SHOP   COMMITTEES   IN   ACTION 

THIS  incident  is  significant: 

After  two  weeks  of  almost  continuous  sessions,  a  joint 
committee  representing  the  employees  and  the  manage- 
ment of  a  big  industrial  plant  completed  its  job.  It 
had  districted  the  plant,  agreed  on  the  method  of  elec- 
tions, and  drawn  up  the  election  rules  and  the  by-laws 
of  the  system.  In  the  course  of  the  meetings  employer 
and  employee  had  come  to  know  each  other  well,  and  the 
distrust  and  suspicion  which  had  marked  the  first  con- 
ferences had  entirely  given  way  to  a  feeling  of  mutual 
respect  and  confidence. 

The  manager  rose,  and  with  more  formality  than  had 
been  customary  in  the  committee,  expressed  his  cordial 
appreciation  of  the  spirit  of  cooperation  which  had 
been  shown  by  the  employee  members,  declared  it  his 
conviction  that  the  management  was  animated  by  the 
same  spirit,  and  concluded  by  remarking  that  from 
this  day  forward  the  relations  between  men  and  man- 
agement were  to  be  on  a  new  basis,  a  basis  which  meant 
square  dealing  and  increased  good  will  on  each  side. 

"I  guess,"  replied  the  chairman  of  the  employees' 
side  of  the  committee,  referring  to  the  bitter  strike 
which  had  preceded  the  establishment  of  the  shop  com- 
mittee system,  "  I  guess  there  won't  be  any  more  serious 
disagreements  between  us." 

"  I'll  make  one  right  here,"  said  the  manager.  "  I 
expect  that  we  shall  disagree.  In  fact,  I  hope  that  we 

82 


SHOP  COMMITTEES  IN  ACTION          83 

shall,  because  all  progress  is  made  by  disagreement. 
But  now  we  have  laid  down  the  rules  of  the  game  and 
we'll  fight  our  disagreements  out  face  to  face.  We'll 
play  the  game." 

Another  incident  which  illustrates  concretely  what  a 
shop  committee  system  may  accomplish  through  its  ap- 
peal to  natural  human  love  of  order  took  place  in  a 
factory  during  the  elections.  A  woman  stenographer, 
a  member  of  the  union,  employed  in  the  office  of,  let 
us  say,  Building  A,  was  told  by  her  chief  that  work 
was  slack  and  was  offered  a  transfer  to  another  depart- 
ment. She  objected,  and  the  man  next  higher  up  in- 
formed her  that  her  work  was  poor.  This  charge  she 
resented  and  in  consequence  refused  to  take  the  trans- 
fer. The  management  thereupon  laid  her  off  till  such 
time  as  the  work  should  pick  up  once  more. 

When  this  occurred  there  was  no  shop  committee  sys- 
tem in  this  plant,  though  a  system  had  been  agreed  on 
and  was  about  to  be  established. 

A.  Typical  Case 

One  of  the  men  in  Building  A  who  happened  to  be  a 
member  of  the  elections  committee,  volunteered  to  do 
what  he  could  to  adjust  this  case  for  the  girl.  His  first 
recourse  was  to  the  head  of  the  employment  office,  who, 
while  not  directly  charged  with  the  settlement  of  griev- 
ances of  this  kind,  was  in  the  habit  of  lending  a  helping 
hand.  This  officer  took  up  the  case  with  the  head  of 
Building  A,  but  was  unable  to  adjust  the  matter  satis- 
factorily. Both  sides  stood  firmly  on  the  record:  The 
management  insisted  that  there  was  no  work  for  the 
girl  and  that  she  was  a  poor  worker;  they  further  in- 
sisted that  she  must  expect  a  lay-off  after  having  re- 
fused a  transfer  to  another  building  where  her  services 
could  be  used.  The  girl  and  her  advocates,  on  the 
other  hand,  insisted  that  this  was  the  first  time  that 


84  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

her  work  had  been  unfavorably  criticized,  claimed  that 
another  girl,  who  did  not  belong  to  the  union,  had  been 
engaged  to  supplant  her,  and  charged  that  the  company 
was  discriminating  against  her  because  of  her  affiliation 
with  organized  labor.  The  case  began  to  assume  serious 
proportions. 

In  the  morning  of  the  day  on  which  Building  A  was 
to  hold  its  shop  committee  election,  the  two  hundred- 
odd  employees  in  this  building  had  become  so  exercised 
over  the  case  that  they  stopped  work.  They  refused  to 
leave  the  factory  or  to  resume  work  till  the  girl  should 
be  reinstated  and  compensated  for  time  lost.  News  of 
this  action  spread  rapidly,  and  in  exaggerated  form, 
throughout  the  plant.  Occurring  as  it  did  in  the  midst 
of  the  elections,  the  incident  seriously  threatened  the 
success  of  the  new  system. 

Yet  the  solution  was  clear  and  simple.  A  member 
of  the  election  committee  secured  permission  to  address 
the  employees  of  Building  A.  After  they  had  been 
assembled  he  spoke  to  them  in  substance  as  follows: 

"  You  claim  that  Miss has  been  discharged  be- 
cause of  union  activities.  The  company  claims  that 
she  has  not  been  discharged  at  all,  but  laid  off  on 
account  of  lack  of  work.  Who  knows  all  the  facts  in 
the  case?  What  means  have  been  taken  to  learn  the 
facts?  If  you  will  go  back  to  work  now,  you  will  have 
the  chance  to  elect  your  shop  committee  this  afternoon, 
and  your  shop  committee  can  find  out  the  facts  and  make 
a  fair  decision.  If  the  shop  committee  cannot  agree, 
there  is  the  general  committee  to  appeal  to  next.  Why 
lose  time  and  money  till  you  know  what  it  is  all  about 
—  till  you  know  that  you're  right  ?  .  You  owe  it  to  the 
company,  but  first  of  all  to  yourselves  to  abide  by  the 
rules  of  the  game." 

A  viva  voce  vote  was  taken  on  the  proposition  to 
resume  work  till  the  committee  election  and  the  investi- 


SHOP  COMMITTEES  IN  ACTION          85 

gation  by  the  committee.  Within  ten  minutes  the  ma- 
chinery in  Building  A  was  running  once  more. 

Within  three  days  the  shop  committee  took  up  the 
case  and  rendered  a  unanimous  decision  which  criticized 

the  management  for  failure  to  teach  Miss properly, 

while  criticizing  Miss for  having  refused  the  trans- 
fer. The  decision  recommended  that  she  be  transferred. 
The  employees  accepted  the  verdict  as  fair,  and  the  case 
was  definitely  settled.  Had  there  been  no  shop  com- 
mittee, in  all  probability  there  would  have  been  a  strike, 
small  or  large,  with  all  that  a  strike  involves  of  loss 
to  both  strikers  and  company. 

It  would  be  possible  to  fill  this  book  with  the  relation 
of  similar  incidents  showing  the  value  to  employer  as 
well  as  to  employee  of  a  shop  committee  system.  The 
claim  is  not  here  made  that  a  shop  committee  system 
will  prevent  all  strikes,  for  no  such  claim  could  be 
sustained  by  experience.  One  of  the  most  unnecessary 
strikes  in  years  occurred  in  January,  1919,  in  a  plant 
in  which  a  shop  committee  system  had  been  installed 
only  a  few  months  before.  In  this  particular  case  the 
condition  which  caused  the  strike  was  not  only  a  local 
condition  —  it  was  a  condition  affecting  other  plants  in 
the  same  industry.  But  it  may  be  stated  with  a  reason- 
able degree  of  accuracy  that  in  the  majority  of  situations 
where  a  strike  is  among  the  possibilities,  it  will  be 
averted  by  a  shop  committee  system,  provided  the  causes 
are  local  to  the  plant,  and  provided  further  that  there 
is  the  feeling  on  both  sides  that  each  side  has  acted  and 
will  act  in  good  faith. 

Petty  Tyranny  Checked 

In  the  ordinary  routine  of  business,  a  shop  committee 
system  eliminates  much  of  the  friction  which  is  only 
too  likely  to  arise  from  the  misunderstandings  or  from 
the  petty  tyranny  of  "bosses."  This  feature  was  re- 


86  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

ferred  to  in  the  report  of  the  Government  Commission 
which  studied  the  Colorado  plan  (see  Chapter  I).  It 
is  an  important  consideration.  Even  in  the  best  man- 
aged industrial  plants  it  is  impossible  to  avoid  the  evils 
which  arise  from  man  clad  with  a  little  brief  authority. 
The  petty  boss,  whether  leading  hand,  price  setter  or 
foreman,  is,  first  of  all,  concerned  with  securing  produc- 
tion. Often  he  is  in  direct  competition  with  the  fore- 
men of  other  jobs,  and  naturally  he  desires  to  make  a 
record  for  his  shop.  This  motive  frequently  leads  him 
to  all  sorts  of  small  and  unnecessary  injustices  toward 
his  employees,  and  if  one  foreman  succeeds  as  a  result 
of  tyranny,  his  competitor  is  likely  to  go  and  do  like- 
wise. The  effect  on  the  men  is  bad.  They  fight  fire 
with  fire  and  may  turn  out  to  be  more  intolerant  and 
less  humanly  reasonable  than  the  foreman  who  started 
the  trouble. 

A  shop  committee  system  acts  as  a  corrective  and 
check  to  this  kind  of  thing.  Both  foreman  and  em- 
ployee know  that  their  actions  may  be  investigated  by 
men  higher  up.  What  they  do  is  a  matter  of  written 
record  in  the  minutes  of  the  shop  committee.  They 
become  responsible,  in  short,  to  the  rank  and  file  of  the 
representatives  of  employers  and  employees  who  make 
up  the  government.  They  feel  keenly  that  the  great 
moral  power  of  public  opinion  is  organized  and  that  it 
stands  ready  to  judge  them.  There  is  the  same  differ- 
ence between  the  old  and  the  new  way  of  conducting 
business  between  men  and  management  as  there  is  be- 
tween life  in  an  unorganized  community  and  one  in 
which  law  and  order  have  been  established. 

The  point  of  view  of  managers  of  industrial  plants 
which  have  adopted  shop  committee  systems  is  well 
put  in  this  quotation  from  an  interview  with  K.  H. 
Eice,  acting  manager  of  the  Lynn  Works  of  the  General 
Electric  Company: 


SHOP  COMMITTEES  IN  ACTION          87 

"...  Through  these  joint  committees  which  I  am  now 
speaking  of,  one  of  the  chief  advantages  of  the  plan  may  be 
realized,  namely,  education  of  the  employee  members  of  these 
committees  in  the  needs,  requirements  and  technicalities  of 
the  business  may  be  brought  about,  and  through  these  members 
an  education  of  the  employees  themselves  may  be  secured  which 
can  in  no  other  way  be  brought  about. 

"  There  are  now  many  industries  throughout  the  country  in 
which  similar  plans  are  in  operation  and  many  cases  of  satis- 
factory working  of  such  plans  are  reported.  In  these  cases  it 
is  found  that  a  great  education  of  employees  and  of  manage- 
ment has  taken  place.  The  employees  find  that  many  of  the 
things  with  which  they  are  dissatisfied  are  promptly  remedied 
while  others  are  more  fanciful  than  real.  They  come  to  a 
better  realization  of  the  difficulties  of  management;  they  learn 
the  need  of  output;  of  a  fair  day's  work  for  a  fair  day's  pay; 
they  get  the  spirit  of  the  management  and  get  into  step  with  it. 

"  On  the  other  hand  the  foremen  learn  to  sympathize  with 
the  point  of  view  of  those  employees  who  are  fair  and  loyal; 
they  learn  better  methods  of  dealing  to  secure  results;  they 
learn  not  to  be  arbitrary  but  to  be  right. 

"  The  management  is  better  in  touch  with  the  spirit  and 
atmosphere  of  the  shop;  the  shop  is  better  in  touch  with  the 
spirit  and  aims  of  the  management." 

The  average  laboring  man  is  as  enthusiastic  about 
shop  committees  as  is  the  intelligent  employer.  To 
members  of  organized  labor,  committees  and  committee 
work  and  procedure  are  an  old  story;  and  union  as 
well  as  non-union  employees  are  generally  quick  to 
realize  what  an  advantage  it  brings  to  their  side  to  have 
a  fair  and  orderly  method  of  transacting  business  with 
employers. 

This  point  may  be  illustrated  by  the  comment  of  a 
labor  leader  representing  both  organized  and  unorgan- 
ized workers,  on  a  shop  committee  system  installed  in 
accordance  with  an  award  of  the  War  Labor  Board. 
For  many  months  prior  to  the  award,  which,  incidentally 
raised  the  wages  some  twenty  per  cent.,  the  feeling  of 
men  toward  management  and  of  management  toward 
men  in  this  plant  was  of  an  almost  unbelievable  bitter- 


88  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

ness.  It  was  the  kind  of  bitterness  which  seems  to 
revolve  in  a  vicious  circle,  requiring  some  radical  out- 
side force  to  destroy  it.  Every  step  taken  under  the 
award  was  hotly  contested,  including,  of  course,  the 
shop  committee  system.  But  when  the  fighting  was 
over,  and  the  shop  committees  were  recognized  and 
running,  a  new  atmosphere  seemed  to  pervade  the  plant. 
Said  the  labor  leader : 

"We  were  very  thankful  to  the  Board  for  bringing 
our  wages  up,  but  that  isn't  the  most  important  thing 
the  Board  did." 

"  What  is  ?  "  he  was  asked. 

"  The  committee  system.  Giving  us  poor  devils  a 
chance  to  go  to  the  old  man  and  tell  him  about  condi- 
tions without  the  risk  of  being  jumped  for  it  by  some 
straw  boss  down  the  line.  You've  never  worked  here  — 
and  you're  lucky.  But  if  you  had,  you  would  appreciate 
what  this  new  deal  means  to  the  rank  and  file." 

Efficiency 

In  the  best  and  largest  sense  of  the  term  the  shop 
committee  brings  efficiency  into  a  factory.  It  is  not  a 
one-sided  efficiency.  It  is  an  efficiency  which  applies 
with  equal  force  to  employer  and  employee.  "  This 
committee  system,"  the  head  of  a  division  of  a  great 
plant  once  told  the  writer,  "  is  a  benefit  to  me  because 
it  enables  me  to  get  better  reports  of  the  work  from 
the  men.  I  have  always  had  plenty  of  reports  from 
my  assistants,  but  the  man  at  the  machine  has  been 
silent.  Now  I  begin  to  know  what  he  is  thinking  about 
his  work,  and  I  find  that  he  has  some  very  valuable 
ideas  about  the  way  the  work  should  be  done.  There 
used  to  be  quite  a  little  cheating  —  running  up  the 
indicators  of  punch  presses  without  material,  and  so 
on.  That  doesn't  go  any  more.  The  committees  frown 
on  it.  Also  there  used  to  be  loss  of  production  and 


SHOP  COMMITTEES  IN  ACTION          89 

friction  because  of  personal  rows  between  the  fore- 
men and  the  men  under  them.  That  doesn't  go  any 
more,  either,  and  we've  got  the  committees  to  thank 
for  that.  The  manager  estimates  that  the  system  costs 
us  about  $8,000  a  year.  I  figure  that  it  doesn't  cost 
us  a  cent,  and  that  we  make  money  on  it  in  increased 
contentment  and  efficiency." 

The  uses  of  shop  committees,  though  they  are  many 
and  various,  are  all  in  the  fulfillment  of  the  same 
general  purpose.  The  Whitley  report  suggests  a  large 
variety  of  problems  which  can  be  adequately  handled 
by  shop  committees  and  which  can  not  be  adequately 
handled  in  any  other  way  yet  devised. 

Another  illustration  of  the  wide  scope  and  solid 
worth  of  joint  committees  comes  from  the  record  of 
the  United  States  Fuel  Administration,  which,  at  a 
critical  moment  in  the  war,  organized  a  system  of  spe- 
cial production  committees  for  the  bituminous  coal 
fields.  Three  representatives  of  the  mine  workers  and 
three  men  representing  the  company  sat  on  each  com- 
mittee. Their  duties  included  the  following: 

To  make  known  the  fact  that  there  must  be  a  large  increase 
in  tonnage  without  which  the  United  States  Government  will 
fail  in  its  war  work. 

To  pass  careful,  and  impartial  judgment  upon  the  reasons 
given  for  absence,  short  hours  worked,  or  other  occurrences 
which  may  have  resulted  in  loss  of  tonnage.  .  .  . 

To  clear  the  record  of  any  worker  who  has  lost  time  or  ton- 
nage through  his  own  fault,  provided  the  worker  is  willing  to 
make  up  the  lost  time  or  tonnage  and  the  operator  is  satisfied 
to  have  him  do  so,  and  provided  also  that  in  doing  so  he  will 
not  violate  any  rules  or  mining  laws  and  will  not  render  it 
difficult  or  impossible  for  the  operator  to  give  an  equal  turn 
of  cars.  .  .  . 

Etc. 

The  shop  committee  movement  is  young,  and  its 
limitations  are  more  apparent  to  some  minds  than  its 


90  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

advantages.  But  its  limitations  are  —  or  should  be  — 
nothing  but  the  ordinary  bounds  of  common  sense  and 
reason.  No  human  association,  no  matter  how  ideally 
organized,  can  be  perfect.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is 
equally  true  that  the  possibilities  of  the  shop  committee 
movement  are  wider  than  the  possibilities  of  the  trades 
union  and  employers'  associations  movements,  for  the 
reason  that  the  shop  committee  represents  the  coming 
together  of  two  elements  which  hitherto  have  been  con- 
spicuous because  they  have  been  apart.  The  shop  com- 
mittee, in  short,  is  a  simple  and  familiar  device  ap- 
plied in  a  new  way  to  meet  and  solve  very  old  problems. 
It  succeeds  where  it  is  estimated  at  its  real  worth  — 
no  more,  and  no  less. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  SHOP   COMMITTEE  AND  THE   UNIONS 

THE  shop  committee  is  so  new  a  thing  in  the  United 
States  that  its  relationship  to  the  trade  union  is  still 
a  matter  of  speculation.  Employers  ask:  Is  the  shop 
committee  a  substitute  for  the  union?  Does  the  shop 
committee  encourage  unionism?  Employees  ask:  Is 
the  shop  committee  a  device  of  capital  to  prevent  union- 
ism? Does  the  shop  committee  discourage  unionism? 
These  questions  we  cannot  answer  with  certainty,  for 
the  shop  committee  is  an  experiment  still  —  an  ex- 
periment in  industrial  government.  Its  history  is  still 
to  be  made. 

Yet  we  may  gather  from  the  scanty  available  records 
here  in  the  United  States  as  well  as  from  the  larger 
experience  in  Great  Britain  enough  information  to  in- 
dicate what  the  relationship  between  the  shop  com- 
mittee and  the  union  labor  movement  will  probably 
grow  into.  Let  us  first  look  at  the  situation  in  Eng- 
land. 

An  article  in  The  Public  x  is  highly  suggestive : 

"  Strikes  on  a  large  scale  in  Great  Britain,  apparently  with- 
out the  knowledge  or  consent  of  the  trade  union  leaders,  are 
exciting  much  comment  on  this  side  of  the  water  by  those  who 
think  that  they  see  an  outbreak  of  Bolshevism  in  England. 
Such  apprehension  springs  from  a  lack  of  understanding  of  the 
British  labor  movement. 

"  There  are  really  two  labor  movements  in  Great  Britain. 
One  is  the  ordinary  craft  unionism,  which  parallels  American 
trade  unionism  very  closely;  the  other  is  the  shop  stewards' 

i  The  Public,  Feb.  15,  1919. 

91 


92 

movement.  And  it  is  not  an  uncommon  thing  for  the  British 
worker  to  come  within  the  scope  of  both  movements.  Some- 
times the  two  pull  together,  and  sometimes  they  are  in  conflict. 

"  The  craft  unions  are  nationally  organized  like  our  own, 
and  all  men  are  organized  by  trades  into  large  national  socie- 
ties. The  shop  stewards  are  individuals  or  committees  who 
represent  the  workers  of  all  trades  in  individual  shops  or 
plants.  Sometimes  they  are  merely  representatives  of  the  va- 
rious unions.  At  other  times  they  represent  the  workers  di- 
rectly and  are  directly  elected.  They  frequently  represent  all 
the  workers  in  a  shop,  whether  members  of  a  union  or  not. 
Occasionally  conflict  is  avoided  by  requiring  the  shop  steward 
to  be  a  member  of  some  union. 

"  There  are  thus  two  systems  pulling  together  sometimes 
and  pulling  in  different  directions  at  other  times,  one  organ- 
ized upon  a  craft  basis  and  the  other  upon  a  shop  basis.  The 
shop  stewards  have  federated,  and  have  built  up  organizations 
composed  wholly  of  shop  stewards,  which  cover  large  areas. 
These  federations  are  headed  toward  the  '  one  big  union ' 
scheme  advocated  by  a  number  of  American  leaders. 

"  There  is  some  advantage  in  having  the  shop  steward  sys- 
tem. It  decentralizes  trade  union  negotiations  remarkably 
and  increases  solidarity.  It  settles  minor  grievances  by  direct 
contact  with  the  employer,  rather  than  through  the  interven- 
tion of  a  union  delegate  and  the  use  of  very  complex  and  cum- 
bersome trade  union  machinery.  The  shop  steward  system  is 
a  short-cut.  It  is  a  protest  against  craft  union  bureaucracy, 
and  its  rapid  growth  during  the  war  was  caused  by  the  inflexi- 
bility of  the  trade  union.  There  are  some  disadvantages,  how- 
ever, as  the  present  situation  in  Great  Britain  will  exemplify. 
The  duality  of  the  organization  raises  the  question  of  alle- 
giance. Sometimes  local  grievances  result  in  strikes,  and 
where  there  is  no  point  of  contact  between  the  shop  stewards 
and  the  trade  unions,  members  of  trade  unions  who  owe  part 
of  their  allegiance  to  a  local  shop  steward  find  themselves  tak- 
ing part  in  unauthorized  strikes  called  by  the  stewards. 
These  strikes  frequently  spread  and  affect  great  areas. 

"  This  is  literally  what  has  been  going  on  for  some  time  over 
the  greater  part  of  the  United  Kingdom.  Labor  disturbances 
of  considerable  magnitude  between  employer  and  employee  are 
occurring  without  any  knowledge  on  the  part  of  the  national 
officials  of  the  various  crafts  involved.  British  trade  unions 
are  in  much  the  same  position  that  the  American  Government 
was  in  just  before  the  Civil  War.  They  have  two  kinds  of 
government  in  the  same  area,  local  and  national,  and  each 


SHOP  COMMITTEE  AND  THE  UNIONS       93 

claims  to  be  supreme.  A  recent  proposal  to  unite  the  two 
movements  and  agree  on  a  practicable  division  of  sovereignty 
was  voted  down,  but  sheer  necessity  will  bring  them  together 
in  the  near  future." 

Making  every  allowance  for  important  differences 
in  national  psychology  and  in  the  character  of 
the  British  and  American  labor  movements,  this  analysis 
describes  with  surprising  accuracy  the  sitiation  which, 
in  the  opinion  of  the  writer,  will  develop  in  the  United 
States.  Mainly  for  the  reason  that  the  shop  committee 
movement  is  not  as  far  advanced  here  as  it  is  in  Great 
Britain,  no  such  conflict  as  that  pictured  in  the  article 
just  quoted  has  yet  arisen.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  none 
will  arise  and  that  a  final  and  satisfactory  relationship 
between  shop  committees  and  the  unions  will  be  worked 
out  in  peaceable  fashion.  But  that  there  will  eventually 
be  a  merging  of  certain  of  the  interests  of  the  shop 
committees  and  certain  of  the  interests  of  the  unions 
can  no  longer  seriously  be  doubted. 

From  its  very  earliest  beginnings  in  the  United  States 
the  shop  committee  movement  has  been  neutral  on  the 
union  question.  For  example,  in  its  contract  with  its 
employees  under  the  plan  of  representation  described  in 
Chapter  I,  the  Colorado  Fuel  and  Iron  Company  speci- 
fically guaranteed  the  right  of  the  workers  to  belong 
to  a  union  or  not,  as  they  chose.  A  similar  guarantee 
is  given  or  implied  in  every  plan  of  representation,  and 
as  has  been  pointed  out  more  than  once,  the  right  to 
belong  to  unions  without  fear  of  discrimination  or  dis- 
charge was  one  of  the  agreed  principles  of  the  War 
Labor  Board. 

Certain  Premises 

On  the  surface,  therefore,  the  shop  committee  is 
neither  a  union  nor  a  non-union  scheme.  It  is  primarily 
a  method  of  organizing  the  employees  of  a  given  plant 


94 


with  the  employers  for  the  purpose  of  bringing  about 
efficiency  and  .better  working  conditions.  The  charac- 
ter of  this  organization  is  in  several  respects  different 
from  trade  union  organization.  One  important  respect 
is  that  the  organization  is  dual  or  joint  and  that  it  is 
based  on  the  theory  of  cooperation  rather  than  on  the 
theory  of  competition  or  conflict. 

Nevertheless  the  shop  committee  has  a  distinct  con- 
nection with  the  union  labor  movement,  and  it  is  well 
for  both  employer  and  employee  to  face  the  facts  and 
understand  the  nature  of  this  connection. 

The  shop  committee  theory  admits  as  an  important 
premise  that  employees  have  the  right  to  organize  as 
employees  of  a  given  plant  in  order  to  deal,  or  bargain, 
collectively,  with  the  management.  If  this  idea  is  not 
recognized,  there  can  be  no  shop  committee  system. 
If  it  is  recognized  and  lived  up  to,  a  shop  committee 
system  can  be  created  and  will  succeed. 

In  the  second  place,  the  shop  committee  theory  ad- 
mits the  premise  that  the  organization  which  will  be 
most  effective  in  securing  the  results  which  are  mutually 
desired,  is  an  organization  of  the  employees  of  a  given 
plant,  and  of  them  alone.  Many  managers  declare: 
"  I  will  meet  with  my  own  employees  at  any  time,  but 
not  with  union  representatives."  To  such  managers  the 
shop  committee  necessarily  makes  a  strong  appeal,  for 
it  is  a  method  of  securing  orderly  and  representative 
meetings  with  employees  and  only  with  employees. 

The  primary  function  of  the  shop  committee  is,  there- 
fore, local  to  the  plant,  and  shop  committee  systems 
may  exist  in  open  shops  or  in  closed  shops  without 
effecting  any  basic  change  in  the  relation  of  the  manage- 
ment to  organized  labor.  This  fact  is  an  impelling 
reason  with  many  employers  for  favoring  the  shop  com- 
mittee movement  and  for  utilizing  it  in  their  plants. 

Putting  to  one  side  the  question  of  union  recognition 


SHOP  COMMITTEE  AND  THE  UNIONS        95 

which  the  shop  committee  does  not  answer  because  it 
does  not  affect  it,  let  us  look  at  the  bearing  of  the  shop 
committee  on  the  union  movement  as  a  whole. 

We  may  say  that  there  are  roughly  three  kinds  of  labor 
organizations:  the  old  standard  craft  or  trade  unions; 
the  newer  industrial  or  group  unions;  and  the  labor 
councils  or  local  central  labor  unions,  composed  of  repre- 
sentatives of  various  union  labor  elements  in  a  com- 
munity. The  prime  object  of  all  these  organizations 
is  mutual  benefit  through  various  forms  of  collective 
bargaining,  and  the  differences  between  them  are  chiefly 
differences  in  methods  of  organization  and  tactics.  On 
the  employers'  side  there  are  manufacturers'  associa- 
tions, chambers  of  commerce,  boards  of  directors  and 
trades  or  industry  councils  which  represent  roughly 
the  economic  interests  of  employers  as  a  class  and  as 
of  a  particular  industry.  For  the  purpose  of  learning 
the  place  which  the  shop  committee  occupies  in  relation 
to  this  system  of  organization  it  is  not  necessary  to 
analyze  it  down  to  a  finer  point. 

Into  this  complex  system  comes  the  shop  committee. 

Like  the  trade  union  the  shop  committee  provides 
a  method  of  collective  bargaining  as  to  wages,  hours 
and  general  conditions  of  labor.  In  plants  where  the 
trade  union  is  recognized,  either  frankly  or  indirectly, 
the  establishment  of  a  shop  committee  system  does  not 
change  fundamentally  the  relationship  between  the  man- 
agement and  its  employees.  In  plants  where  the  trade 
union  is  not  recognized,  the  shop  committee  provides 
the  only  means  of  establishing  collective  bargaining, 
and  to  this  extent  therefore  accomplishes  one  of  the 
things  for  which  the  trade  union  exists. 

Shop  Committees  Overlap  Unions 

Unlike  the  trade  union,  the  shop  committee  provides 
a  method  of  handling  all  sorts  of  conditions  in  a  plant, 


96  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

general  and  special  alike.  In  plants  where  the  union 
is  recognized,  the  shop  committee,  while  not  affecting 
fundamentally  the  relationship  between  the  management 
and  its  employees,  provides  both  with  machinery  for 
the  joint  settlement  of  local  or  domestic  plant  disputes 
which  are  not  of  enough  importance  to  warrant  calling 
in  union  representatives.  In  plants  where  the  union 
is  not  recognized,  the  shop  committee  performs  this 
same  function  and  in  addition  provides,  or  attempts 
to  provide,  machinery  for  the  settling  of  all  disputes, 
great  and  small.  The  shop  committee  therefore  to  a 
certain  extent  in  closed  shops  and  to  a  large  extent  in 
open  shops  takes  the  place  of  the  trade  union. 

For  the  reasons  just  enumerated  the  shop  committee 
appeals  naturally  to  employers  who  do  not  recognize 
the  unions,  and  conversely  tends  to  arouse  the  antago- 
nism of  labor  union  advocates  and  members. 

Another  important  fact  in  this  connection  is  that  the 
shop  committee  movement  in  the  United  States  is  neither 
primarily  a  labor  movement  nor  a  movement  promoted 
solely  by  employers.  It  has  advocates  and  opponents 
in  both  camps.  It  has  had,  as  we  have  seen,  a  power- 
ful promoter  in  the  United  States  Government,  which, 
it  is  to  be  assumed,  acted  as  representative  neither 
of  capital  nor  of  labor,  but  of  the  public.  In  its  present 
stage,  then,  the  shop  committee  movement  is  in  the 
best  possible  position  for  development  along  lines  which 
will  make  it  of  the  largest  service  to  the  three  parties 
concerned  in  the  maintenance  of  industrial  peace, 
namely,  employers,  employees  and  the  public. 

Wholly  outside  of  the  relationship  established  by  shop 
committees  between  men  and  management  in  given 
plants  is  the  relationship  between  the  shop  committee 
and  the  general  union  labor  movement.  We  have  seen 
that  the  establishment  of  a  shop  committee  system  in 
a  factory  does  not  in  theory  at  least  bring  about  union 


SHOP  COMMITTEE  AND  THE  UNIONS        97 

recognition,  and  that  it  does  not,  in  theory  once  more, 
encourage  unionism.  But  does  it  not  in  fact  advance 
the  tenets  of  unionism  in  general?  Is  not  the  shop 
committee  a  training  school  in  industrial  organization, 
and  will  not  the  workers  thus  taught  the  advantages 
and  technique  of  organization,  incline  more  and  more 
to  enter  the  wider  field  of  labor  organization  as  repre- 
sented by  the  trade  union?  Is  it  a  fair  statement  of 
the  case  to  say  that  the  shop  committee  is  at  best  a 
temporary  expedient  designed  to  avoid  the  apparent 
recognition  of  the  union,  while  in  reality  recognizing 
the  essential  principles  of  the  trade  union? 

At  just  this  point  it  is  well  to  emphasize  one  central 
difference  between  the  labor  situation  in  the  United 
States  and  the  situation  in  England,  to  which  we 
naturally  turn  for  information  and  guidance  on  mat- 
ters both  of  political  and  of  industrial  government. 
The  trade  union  movement  in  England  is  older  and 
more  mature  than  it  is  in  this  country.  The  ques- 
tion of  union  recognition  has  there  been  decided  in  the 
main  in  favor  of  the  unions.  We  are  consequently 
not  surprised  to  find  in  the  Whitley  report  that  works 
or  shop  committees  are  strongly  recommended,  not  as 
a  means  of  supplanting  the  unions,  but  as  a  means  of 
supplementing  the  work  of  the  unions  of  employers  as 
well  as  the  unions  of  employees.  We  read  in  the 
supplement  to  this  report : * 

".  .  .  Our  proposals  as  a  whole  assume  the  existence  of 
organizations  of  both  employers  and  employed  and  a  frank  and 
full  recognition  of  such  organizations.  Works  committees  es- 
tablished otherwise  than  in  accordance  with  these  principles' 
could  not  be  regarded  as  a  part  of  the  scheme  we  have  recom- 
mended, and  might  indeed  be  a  hindrance  to  the  development 
of  the  new  relations  in  industry  to  which  we  look  forward. 
We  think  the  aim  should  be  the  complete  and  coherent  organ- 

i  See  Appendix. 


98  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

ization  of  the  trade  on  both  sides,  and  works  committees  will 
be  of  value  in  so  far  as  they  contribute  to  such  a  result. 

"  We  are  of  opinion  that  the  complete  success  of  works  com- 
mittees necessarily  depends  largely  upon  the  degree  and  effi- 
ciency of  organization  in  the  trade,  and  upon  the  extent  to 
which  the  committees  can  be  linked  up,  through  organizations 
that  we  have  in  mind,  with  the  remainder  of  the  scheme  which 
we  are  proposing,  viz.,  the  district  and  national  councils.  We 
think  it  important  to  state  that  the  success  of  the  works  com- 
mittees would  be  very  seriously  interfered  with  if  the  idea 
existed  that  such  committees  were  used,  or  likely  to  be  used, 
by  employers  in  opposition  to  trade-unionism.  It  is  strongly 
felt  that  the  setting  up  of  works  committees  without  the  co- 
operation of  the  trade-unions  and  employers'  associations  in 
the  trade  or  branch  of  trade  concerned  would  stand  in  the 
way  of  the  improved  industrial  relationships  which  in  these 
reports  we  are  endeavoring  to  further." 

To  the  great  mass  of  American  labor  the  statement 
of  these  principles  has  doubtless  been  a  cause  of  satis- 
faction :  certainly  these  principles  meet  with  the  ap- 
proval of  organized  American  labor.  To  the  great 
mass  of  American  employers  the  quotation  just  given 
will  doubtless  appeal  as  an  excellent  argument  against 
the  establishment  of  shop  committees  in  the  United 
States.  Viewed  in  the  light  of  the  Whitley  report, 
the  shop  committee  is  seen  to  be  an  adjunct  to  the 
trade  union,  and  the  encouragement  of  the  one  appar- 
ently means  the  encouragement  of  the  other  with  all  that 
that  implies  of  renewal  of  the  old  conflict,  abuses  of 
privilege,  and  the  like. 

But  this  overlooks  the  vital  fact  that  the  shop  com- 
mittee is  a  dual  or  joint  form  of  organization.  This 
fact  brings  into  the  situation  an  entirely  new  element, 
affecting  the  situation  fundamentally.  Moreover,  it 
must  be  remembered  that  the  shop  committee  is  but 
one  branch  of  a  new  system  of  industrial  government, 
already  in  existence  in  England  and  rapidly  taking  root 
in  the  United  States  also.  This  system  of  government 


SHOP  COMMITTEE  AND  THE  UNIONS        99 

was  outlined  in  the  Whitley  report.1  Like  the  shop 
committee,  it  is  dual  or  joint  in  character.  The  shop 
committee  is  but  the  lowest  unit;  the  next  highest  is 
the  joint  industrial  council  for  the  locality;  the  next 
highest  the  joint  industrial  council  for  the  industry; 
and  the  highest  we  may  conceive  to  be  a  joint  council 
or  parliament  for  all  the  industries  of  a  nation.  Such 
an  organization  of  both  employers  and  employees  is 
fast  on  the  road  to  realization  in  the  United  States. 

The  Joint  Union  Principle 

Viewed  in  this  light,  then,  the  question  of  the  re- 
lationship of  the  shop  committee  to  the  union  appears 
to  be  a  matter  of  relatively  minor  importance,  for  the 
reason  that  both  the  labor  union  and  the  employers' 
union  are  in  process  of  changing  their  functions  and 
of  adjusting  themselves  to  the  new  forms  of  joint 
union  based  on  the  principles  laid  down  in  the  previous 
chapters  as  the  principles  of  the  shop  committee.  It  is 
now,  therefore,  seen  to  be  the  fact  that  the  shop  com- 
mittee promotes  unionization  of  the  workers,  just  as  it 
promotes  unionization  of  the  employers,  but  that  it 
promotes  this  unionization  for  a  fresh  purpose  and  in  a 
fresh  way.  Motive  in  human  affairs  is  everything. 
The  motive  of  the  old  labor  union  and  of  the  old  manu- 
facturers' association  was  primarily  defensive,  hence 
militant,  and  hence  to  some  extent  destructive.  The 
motive  of  the  new  union  is  constructive.  It  looks  toward 
cooperation  instead  of  competition,  towards  strife  only 
as  a  last  resort. 

"  Labor  believes,"  writes  W.  L.  MacKenzie  King  in  the  book 
already  quoted  in  these  pages,  "  that  its  exclusion  from  repre- 
sentation in  the  control  of  industry  has  led  to  vast  injustice, 
and  to  the  organization  of  business  for  profit  alone;  and  that 

iSee  Chapter  I. 


100  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

it  has  occasioned  at  times  the  misuse  of  official  power  by  the 
courts,  the  police,  and  military  authorities  in  support  of  arbi- 
trary conduct  on  the  part  of  corporations.  Herein  lies  the 
fundamental  cause  of  the  warfare  between  capital  and  labor. 
Denied  the  right  to  cooperate  with  capital,  labor  competes  with 
capital.  Industrial  life,  instead  of  being  in  the  nature  of  a 
partnership,  becomes  a  sort  of  guerilla  warfare  in  which 
capital  seeks  to  increase  profits  at  the  expense  of  labor,  and 
labor  seeks  to  increase  wages  at  the  expense  of  capital.  On 
the  one  side  is  a  misunderstanding  of  producing  costs;  on  the 
other  side,  a  misunderstanding  of  the  workers'  needs  and 
aspirations.  Strikes  and  lockouts  are  the  crude  expression  of 
the  resentment  which  this  mutual  misunderstanding  begets. 
Until  labor  and  capital  are  both  democratically  represented  in 
the  control  of  the  business  carrying  their  respective  invest- 
ments, this  warfare  and  anarchy  are  certain  to  persist.  The 
organization  of  business,  its  terminology  and  its  spirit,  must 
all  change  if  industry  is  to  fulfill  its  true  mission  and  be  made 
to  reflect  a  real  partnership." 

Except  therefore  to  those  minds  which  do  not  yet 
clearly  see  that  the  industrial  world  of  to-day  and  of 
to-morrow  is  a  different  world  from  that  of  yesterday, 
the  answer  to  the  questions  at  the  head  of  this  chapter 
is  this: 

The  shop  committee  encourages  unionism.  It  is  not 
the  unionism  of  the  past,  inadequate,  imperfect,  strug- 
gling sometimes  blindly  towards  juster  relations  between 
capital  and  labor.  The  shop  committee,  meaning 
thereby  the  idea  of  joint  shop,  and  industrial  commit- 
tees and  councils,  is  a  substitute  for  trade  unionism. 
It  is  a  substitute  which  the  unions  and  the  employers 
will  welcome.  The  shop  committee,  therefore,  is  not  a 
device  of  capital  to  prevent  unionism:  its  seeds  lie 
deep  in  the  soil  of  unionism,  so  deep  that  unionism  of 
employees  alone  can  not  cause  them  to  grow  and  flourish. 
The  shop  committee  has  in  it  the  germ  of  the  hope 
of  the  future  of  industrial  peace  and  the  cooperative 
commonwealth." 


APPENDIX 

SUPPLEMENTARY  KEPORT  ON  WORKS  COMMITTEES  l 

In  our  first  and  second  reports  we  have  referred  to  the  estab- 
lishment of  works  committees,  representative  of  the  manage- 
ment and  of  the  workpeople,  and  appointed  from  within  the 
works,  as  an  essential  part  of  the  scheme  of  organization  sug- 
gested to  secure  improved  relations  between  employers  and 
employed.  The  purpose  of  the  present  report  is  to  deal  more 
fully  with  the  proposal  to  institute  such  committees. 

2.  Better  relations  between  employers  and  their  workpeople 
can  best  be  arrived  at  by  granting  to  the  latter  a  greater  share 
in  the  consideration  of  matters  with  which  they  are  concerned. 
In  every  industry  there  are  certain  questions,  such  as  rates  of 
wages  and  hours  of  work,  which  should  be  settled  by  district 
or  national  agreement,   and  with  any   matter   so   settled  no 
works  committee  should  be  allowed  to  interfere;  but  there  are 
also  many  questions  closely  affecting  daily  life  and  comfort  in, 
and  the  success  of,  the  business,  and  affecting  in  no  small  de- 
gree efficiency  of  working,  which  are  peculiar  to  the  individual 
workshop  or  factory.     The  purpose  of  a  works  committee  is  to 
establish  and  maintain  a  system  of  cooperation  in  all  these 
workshop  matters. 

3.  We  have  throughout  our  recommendations  proceeded  upon 
the  assumption  that  the  greatest  success  is  likely  to  be  achieved 
by  leaving  to  the  representative  bodies  of  employers  and  em- 
ployees in  each  industry  the  maximum  degree  of  freedom  to 
settle  for  themselves  the  precise  form  of  council  or  committee 
which  should  be  adopted,  having  regard  in  each  case  to  the 
particular  circumstances  of  the  trade;  and,  in  accordance  with 
this  principle,  we  refrain  from  indicating  any  definite  form  of 
constitution  for  the  works  committees.     Our  proposals  as  a 
whole  assume  the  existence  of  organizations  of  both  employers 
and  employed  and  a  frank  and  full  recognition  of  such  organ- 

i  Supplementary  to  the  Whitley  report.  Great  Britain,  Min- 
istry of  Reconstruction.  Committee  on  relations  between  em- 
ployers and  employed.  London,  1918. 

101 


102  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

izatlons.  Works  committees  established  otherwise  than  in 
accordance  with  these  principles  could  not  be  regarded  as  a 
part  of  the  scheme  we  have  recommended,  and  might  indeed 
be  a  hindrance  to  the  development  of  the  new  relations  in  in- 
dustry to  which  we  look  forward.  We  think  the  aim  should  be 
the  complete  and  coherent  organization  of  the  trade  on  both 
sides,  and  works  committees  will  be  of  value  in  so  far  as  they 
contribute  to  such  a  result. 

4.  We  are  of  opinion  that  the  complete  success  of  works 
committees  necessarily  depends  largely  upon  the  degree  and 
efficiency  of  organization  in  the  trade,  and  upon  the  extent 
to  which  the  committees  can  be  linked  up,  through  organiza- 
tions that  we  have  in  mind,  with  the  remainder  of  the  scheme 
which  we  are  proposing,  viz.,  the  district  and  national  councils. 
We  think  it  important  to  state  that  the  success  of  the  works 
committees  would  be  very  seriously  interfered  with  if  the  idea 
existed  that  such  committees  were  used,  or  likely  to  be  used, 
by  employers  in  opposition  to  trade-unionism.     It  is  strongly 
felt   that   the   setting   up   of   works   committees   without   the 
cooperation  of  the  trade-unions  and  the  employers'  associations 
in  the  trade  or  branch  of  trade  concerned  would  stand  in  the 
way  of  the  improved  industrial  relationships  which  in  these 
reports  we  are  endeavoring  to  further. 

5.  In  an  industry  where  the  workpeople  are  unorganized,  or 
only  very  partially  organized,  there  is  a  danger  that  works 
committees  may  be  used,  or  thought  to  be  used,  in  opposition 
to  trade-unionism.     It  is  important  that  such  fears  should  be 
guarded   against  in  the  initiation  of  any   scheme.     We   look 
upon  successful  works  committees  as  the  broad  base  of  the 
industrial  structure  which  we  have  recommended,  and  as  the 
means  of  enlisting  the  interest  of  the  workers  in  the  success 
both  of  the  industry  to  which  they  are  attached  and  of  the 
workshop   or   factory  where   so  much   of  their   life  is   spent. 
These  committees  should  not,  in  constitution  or  methods  or 
working,  discourage  trade  organizations. 

6.  Works  committees,  in  our  opinion,  should  have  regular 
meetings  at  fixed  times,  and,  as  a  general  rule,  not  less  fre- 
quently than  once  a  fortnight.     They  should  always  keep  in 
the  forefront  the  idea  of  constructive  cooperation  in  the  im- 
provement of  the  industry  to  which  they  belong.     Suggestions 
of  all  kinds  tending  to  improvement  should  be  frankly  wel- 
comed  and    freely   discussed.     Practical    proposals    should    be 
examined  from  all  points  of  view.     There  is  an  undeveloped 
asset  of  constructive  ability  —  valuable  alike  to  the  industry 
and  to  the  State  —  awaiting  the  means  of  realization ;  prob- 


APPENDIX  103 

lems,  old  and  new,  will  find  their  solution  in  a  frank  partner- 
ship of  knowledge,  experience  and  good  will.  Works  commit- 
tees would  fail  in  their  main  purpose  if  they  existed  only  to 
smooth  over  grievances. 

7.  We  recognize  that,  from  time  to  time,  matters  will  arise 
which  the  management  or  the  workmen  consider  to  be  ques- 
tions they  cannot  discuss  in  these  joint  meetings.     When  this 
occurs,  we  anticipate  that  nothing  but  good  will  come  from 
the  friendly  statement  of  the  reasons  why  the  reservation  is 
made. 

8.  We  regard  the  successful  development  and  utilization  of 
works  committees  in  any  business  on  the  basis  recommended 
in  this  report  as  of  equal  importance  with  its  commercial  and 
scientific  efficiency;  and  we  think  that  in  every  case  one  of  the 
partners  or  directors,  or  some  other  responsible  representative 
of  the  management,  would  be  well  advised  to  devote  a  sub- 
stantial part  of  his  time  and  thought  to  the  good  working  and 
development  of  such  a  committee. 

9.  There  has  been  some  experience,  both  before  the  War  and 
during  the  War,  of  the  benefits  of  works  committees,  and  we 
think  it  should  be  recommended  most  strongly  to  employers 
and  employed  that,  in  connection  with  the  scheme  for  the  estab- 
lishment  of    national    and    district   industrial    councils,    they 
should  examine  this  experience  with  a  view  to  the  institution 
of   works   committees   on   proper    lines,   in   works   where    the 
conditions  render  their  formation  practicable.     We  have  rec- 
ommended that  the  Ministry  of  Labor  should  prepare  a  sum- 
mary   of    the   experience   available    with    reference   to    works 
committees,  both  before  and  during  the  War,  including  infor- 
mation as  to  any  rules  or  reports  relating  to  such  committees, 
and  should  issue  a  memorandum  thereon  for  the  guidance  of 
employers  and  workpeople  generally,  and  we  understand  that 
such  a  memorandum  is  now  in  course  of  preparation. 

10.  In  order  to  insure  uniform  and  common  principles  of 
action,  it  is  essential  that  where  national  and  district  indus- 
trial councils  exist  the  works  committees  should  be  in  close 
touch  with  them,  and  the  scheme  for  linking  up  works  com- 
mittees with  the  councils  should  be  considered  and  determined 
by  the  national  councils. 

11.  We  have  considered  it  better  not  to  attempt  to  indicate 
any  specific  form  of  works  committees.     Industrial  establish- 
ments show  such  infinite  variation  in  size,  number  of  persons 
employed,  multiplicity  of  departments,   and   other  conditions, 
that  the  particular  form  of  works  committees  must  necessarily 
be  adapted  to  the  circumstances  of  each  case.     It  would,  there- 


104  THE  SHOP  COMMITTEE 

fore,  be  impossible  to  formulate  any  satisfactory  scheme  which 
does  not  provide  a  large  measure  of  elasticity. 

We  are  confident  that  the  nature  of  the  particular  organiza- 
tion necessary  for  the  various  cases  will  be  settled  without 
difficulty  by  the  exercise  of  good  will  on  both  sides. 

EXISTING  SHOP  COMMITTEE  SYSTEMS 

As  this  book  goes  to  press  (April,  1919),  many  large  and 
email  industrial  plants  are  putting  in  shop  committee  systems. 
It  is  therefore  impossible  to  report  a  complete  list  of  such  sys- 
tems in  existence  in  the  United  States  at  the  present  time. 
The  following  list  is  admittedly  incomplete  and  is  offered  to 
the  reader  for  whatever  it  may  be  worth. 

Plans  installed  by  the  National  War  Labor  Board 
Bethlehem  Steel  Co.,  South  Bethlehem,  Pa. 
Corn  Products  Refining  Co.,  four  plants,  Granite  City,  Ills., 

Argo,  Ills.,  Pekin,  Ills.,  and  Edgewater,  N.  J. 
General  Electric  Co.,  two  plants,  Pittsfield,  Mass.,  and  Lynn, 

Mass. 

Maryland  Pressed  Steel  Co.,  Hagerstown,  Md. 
Mason  Machine  Works,  Taunton,  Mass. 
Munition  Establishments  at  Bridgeport,  Conn.,  over  sixty  in 

number. 

Philadelphia  Rapid  Transit  Co.,  Philadelphia,  Pa. 
Smith  &  Wesson  Co.,  Springfield,  Mass. 
Standard  Wheel  Co.,  Terre  Haute,  Ind. 
Waynesboro,  Pa.,  machine  shops. 
Willys-Overland  Plant,  Elyria,  Ohio. 

In  addition,  the  War  Labor  Board  ordered  shop  committee 
systems  in  the  Virginia  Bridge  and  Iron  Co.,  Roanoke,  Va.; 
the  Southern  California  Iron  and  Steel  Co.,  Los  Angeles,  Calif. ; 
the  Worthington  Pump  and  Machinery  Corporation  and  the 
Power  and  Mining  Works,  Cudahy,  Wis.;  the  New  York  Cen- 
tral Iron  Works,  Inc.,  Hagerstown,  Md. ;  the  Savage  Arms 
Corporation,  Utica,  N.  Y. ;  and  others.  The  plans  first  listed 
are  apparently  the  most  elaborate. 

Other  Plans 

Colorado  Fuel  and  Iron  Co.,  Colorado. 
Standard  Oil  Co.  of  New  Jersey,  Bayonne,  N.  J. 
International  Harvester  Co.,  Chicago,  Ills.,  several  plants. 
Wm.  Demnth  &  Co.,  Richmond  Hill,  N.  Y. 
Packard  Piano  Co.,  Fort  Wayne,  Ind. 


APPENDIX  105 

Bethlehem  Shipbuilding  Corporation,  Sparrow's  Point,  Md. 

Printz-Biederman  Co.,  Cleveland,  O. 

Morris  Herrmann  &  Co.,  Newark,  N.  J. 

Irving-Pitt  Manufacturing  Co.,  Kansas  City,  Mo. 

American  Rolling  Mills  Co.,  Middletown,  O. 

Browning  Co.,  Cleveland,  O. 

Acme  Wire  Co.,  New  Haven,  Conn. 

Dennison  Manufacturing  Co.,  Framingham,  Mass. 

Dutches*  Manufacturing  Co.,  Poughkeepsie,  N.  Y. 

Globe  Wernicke  Co.,  Cincinnati,  O. 

Hart  Schaffner  &  Marx,  Chicago,  Ills. 

Hickey-Freeman  Co.,  Rochester,  N.  Y. 

Hydraulic  Pressed  Steel  Co.,  Cleveland,  O. 

Jeffrey  Mfg.  Co.,  Kansas  City,  Mo. 

The  Joseph  &  Feiss  Co.,  Cleveland,  O. 

Leeds  Northrup  Co.,  Philadelphia,  Pa. 

Proctor  and  Gamble  Co.,  Ivorydale,  O. 

White  Motor  Co.,  Cleveland,  0. 

Carroll  Foundry  and  Machine  Co.,  Bucyrus,  O. 

Hercules  Powder  Co.,  Kenvil,  N.  J. 

Sidney  Blumenthal  Co.,  Shelton,  Conn. 

Morse  Dry  Dock  Co.,  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 

Garner  Print  Works,  Wappinger  Falls,  N.  Y. 

Sprague  Electric  Works,  Bloomfield,  N.  J. 

Midvale  Steel  and  Ordnance  Co.,  and  subsidiaries,  Johns- 
town, Pa. 

Shipyards  wherever  covered  by  Government  awards. 

Loyal  Legion  of  Loggers  and  Lumbermen,  Portland,  Ore. 
( headquarters ) . 

Inland  Steel  Co.,  Indiana  Harbor,  Ind. 


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